ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

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ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES
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US Exclusive Economic zone

• Written into law in March 1983
• Extends 200 miles out to sea
• Foreign vessels must be invited to fish there

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US Exclusive Economic zone

• Fig 11.1 p 315 map in book

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Food chain disruption

• Remember the food chains Fig 13.20 p 394
• Today there is a decrease in the Stellar sea lion
  populations in the Gulf of Alaska
• Stellar sea lions eat Pollock
• Pollock is a great tasting fish, so we eat it
• Therefore Pollock is over fished

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Endangered SpeciesSource NOAA

• ESA Listing Rule - Endangered Status for Western
  population62 FR 2434505/05/1997ESA Listing Rule -
  Threatened Status55 FR 4920411/26/1990Critical
  Habitat Designation58 FR 4526908/27/1993Protection
  Measures for the Groundfish Fisheries Off
  Alaska68 FR 20401/02/2003Recovery
  Plann/a12/1992Draft Revised Recovery
  Plan71 FR 2991905/24/2006

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• http//www.fws.gov/endangered/laws-policies/

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Steller Sea Lion
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• Bycatch fish caught in nets besides the target
  fish p 414 - 415
• All fish caught inside our economic zone must be
  reported to the US government
• Trawling Fig 13.26 p 398
• http//youtu.be/9Uo-YpFHV70 play this video

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Trawling
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Trawl fishing
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Pelagic Longline
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Protecting our inland water ways

• In coming ships
• Ballast stowaways
• Toxic spills
• Destruction of fragile flora and fauna
• There is a quit a bit of talk about the great
  lakes water way right now

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Coastal wet lands

• Under the federal Clean Water Act, states are
  required to have a method in place to protect wet
  lands (it may not actually work, but it must be
  in place)

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Clean water act

• 564 page document with several amendments.

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Mangroves

• Remember what happened to the coasts and people
  of the islands during the tsunami of 2004
• Salt marshes and mangroves Fig 11.13 p 325 Read p
  324 326
• What else are mangroves good for?
• Habitat for fish and shell fish larvae,
  juveniles, as well as adults

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Pollution

• What is pollution
• Pages 326- 327

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• Chesapeake Bay

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• http//www.youtube.com/watch?voILB2LwfKYo

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Oil

• There has been some really bad oil spills
• Largest spill was in1991 during the first Gulf
  war
• Oil spill in the Black Sea November 2007
• BP deep ocean well blowout 2010
• How much oil do you think we actually recover?
• Only between 8 -15

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Oil cont.

• No. 2 fuel oil - A complex combination of
  hydrocarbons with carbon numbers in the range C9
  and higher produced from the distillation of
  petroleum crude oil.
• This is often the stuff of which oil spills are
  made.
• Fig 11.19 p 332 book

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Oil cont.
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Cleaning up Oil

• Click on title

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• Dumping garbage into the Great Lakes is
  prohibited by law, but it continues under the
  very eyes of the Coast Guard.

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Two points I want you to cover from the book

• Osmosis the movement of water through a
  semipermiable membrane. Read this in your text.
  We saw this in marine animals.
• Maintenance of body temperature, look at cold
  blooded vs. warm blooded

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Double hulled ships
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Radioactive waste

• Click on Chernobyl incident
• Run through the news stories
• How do we get rid of this mess
• Some suggest dumping it into the subduction
  zones.
• Do you think that will work?

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Radio active waste
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Low oxygen levels Ch 11

• Where do they occur ?
• Gulf of Mexico, Black Sea, Red Sea
• What causes them ?
• Major cause is fertilizer in the water

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Waste management

• How can we make a difference?

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Marine plastic pollution

• There is a law against dumping plastic from ships
• It is a danger to the marine animals Fig. 11.29
  p 338

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Coral reef pollution
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LA River trash recovery
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Plastic pollution

• Box 11.2 p 339
• plastic is the only substance that can not be
  dumped in the ocean
• Eastern Pacific Garbage Patch
• Fig 11.30 p 340

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Eastern Pacific Garbage Patch
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Birds eat plastics
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Cape fur seal lying on rock, dead of suffocation
from a plastic wire wound around its neck, South
Africa.
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Marine plastic pollution
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Toxins

• Heavy metals
• any of a number of higher atomic weight elements,
  which has the properties of a metallic substance
  at room temperature, we are interested in those
  that are toxic to marine life, Cu, Hg, Bi, As,
  Al,
• Concentrations of toxic waste is found
• in sediments
• In shellfish
• how does this work? I went over this in class

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Toxins

• Minamata disease Hg
• Fig 11.25 p 335

Children with Congenital Minamata Disease due to
intrauterine methylmercury poisoning. Photo
credit Harada 1986.
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Hg p 336
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The mad hatter

• What was this like, what caused it? Why the
  name, mad hatter?

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Toxins

• Lead poisoning Government agencies estimated
  that it would cost 16.6 billion per year from
  2001 to 2010 to inspect and clean up lead paint
  hazards in houses that have not yet been cleaned
  up.
• Do you think this has been completed?

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Phytoremediation

• Dept. Horticulture Science, HFSB 416, Texas AM
  University,College Station, Texas 77843-2133.

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Phytoremediation
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How PCBs are used today

• Capacitors may contain PCBs, as well as
  fluorescent light ballasts, transformers, X-ray
  equipment and vacuum pumps, lubricating and
  cutting oils, and as additives in pesticides,
  paints, carbonless copy (NCR) paper, adhesives,
  sealants, plastics, reactive flame retardants,
  and as a fixative for microscopy.

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PCBs and DDT

• Polychlorinated biphenyls p 334 335
• DDT
• Greatest use in the early 1960
• Are no longer made or used in the USA
• Are still entering the environment
• Remain in sediments for long time
• Fig 11.24 p 335

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Boston Harbor sewage effluent
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• Blue colors meet swimming standard, red-purple
  colors exceed swimming standard of 35
  colonies/100 ml.

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• In depositional areas, weak tidal currents or
  depressions in the seafloor allow solids to
  settle and become soft sediments. These areas are
  most affected by pollution because toxic
  materials and oxygen-consuming organic matter
  tend to adhere to solid particles and settle to
  the bottom with them.

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Boston Harbor sewage project

• Fig 11.23 p 334

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New York Bight

• Page 333 why was this discontinued?

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Waste management

• How can we make a difference?

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When was the Federal Clean Water Act passed?
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• 1972

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• Good luck on your exams.