The UK Ocean Acidification Research Programme

Sea urchins may be particularly sensitive to ocean acidification and are important ecosystems engineers. Image courtesy of Rob Ellis, Plymouth Marine Laboratory.The 5 year UK Ocean Acidification Research Programme is the UK’s response to growing concerns over ocean acidification and is jointly funded by Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC).

The programme will collaborate with other ocean acidification programms from around the world and aim to:

  1. Reduce uncertainties in predictions of carbonate chemistry changes and their effects on marine biogeochemistry, ecosystems and other components of the Earth System
  2. Understand the responses to ocean acidification, and other climate change related stressors, by marine organisms, biodiversity and ecosystems and to improve understanding of their resistance or susceptibility to acidification
  3. Provide data and effective advice to policy makers and managers of marine bioresources on the potential size and timescale of risks, to allow for development of appropriate mitigation and adaptation strategies.

 

Ocean acidification will effect marine organisims, particularly those which build outer shells and calcifying plankton such as the coccolithophore shown. Image courtesy of Anastasia Charalampopoulou, National Oceanography CentreThe outputs of this programme will include:

  • Feed into the cross-government Climate Change Adaptation programme
  • Make a significant contribution to the Living With Environmental Change programme
  • Provide evidence to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 5th Assessment Report on Climate Change
  • Provide information to marine bioresource managers, policy makers negotiating CO2 emissions reduction and other stakeholders

 

Six projects have now been funded, each delivering a key part of the Programme, designed to answer the following questions:

How much variability is there in oceanic CO2 uptake and what are the trends for the future?
Led by Professor Andrew Watson, University of East Anglia

What are the impacts of ocean acidification on key benthic (seabed) ecosystems, communities, habitats, species and their life cycles?
Led by Dr Stephen Widdicombe, Plymouth Marine Laboratory

How will ocean acidification affect the biology of surface ocean communities and biogeochemistry, and how that might feedback to climate?
Led by Dr Toby Tyrrell, National Oceanography Centre

What are the potential impacts of ocean acidification on the ocean and how it might amplify rising CO2 and climate change?
Led by Dr Andy Ridgwell, University of Bristol

How will ocean acidification impact ecosystems and chemical cycling in UK and Arctic regional seas?
Led by Dr Jerry Blackford, Plymouth Marine Laboratory

What were the effects of rapid ocean acidification events in the Earth’s past?
Led by Professor Paul Pearson, Cardiff University

What are the potential impacts of ocean acidification on the life stages of commercially important species, on their associated ecosystems and socio-economics, and their capacity to resist and adapt?
Led by Professor Kevin Flynn, University of Swansea

These projects are supported by the Knowledge Exchange Office, based at Plymouth Marine Laboratory, and a national analytical facility led by Professor Eric Achterberg, National Oceanography Centre.

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