Saved By Whales
Let’s start with a ridiculous theory and then play Spot The Motive to see why the Great Unwashed have suddenly picked up on it.
Firstly, a daft idea to cure the earth of the imaginary global warming crisis: whale droppings
Southern Ocean sperm whales are an unexpected ally in the fight against global warming, removing the equivalent carbon emissions from 40,000 cars each year thanks to their faeces, a study found on Wednesday.
The cetaceans have been previously fingered as climate culprits because they breathe out carbon dioxide (CO2), the commonest greenhouse gas.
Of course you also breathe out carbon dioxide and there are more humans than whales so You Are More Evil Than A Whale! Take that thought with you for the day….
But the whales can do something really cool. Something you can’t do – unless maybe if you are Bono:
Australian biologists estimated that the estimated 12,000 sperm whales in the Southern Ocean each defecate around 50 tonnes of iron into the sea every year after digesting the fish and squid they hunt.
The iron is a terrific food for phytoplankton — marine plants that live near the ocean surface and which suck up CO2 from the atmosphere through photosynthesis.
As a result of faecal fertilisation, the whales remove 400,000 tonnes of carbon each year, twice as much as the 200,000 tonnes of CO2 that they contribute through respiration.
Now we get to the spooky bit. Why has this come up all-of-a-sudden-by-accident? Yes, indeedy, it’s the imminent resumption of limited whaling this week:
Industrialised whaling not only gravely threatened Southern Ocean sperm whales, it also damaged a major carbon “sink,” the scientific term for something that removes more greenhouse gases than it produces… The future of sperm whales and other species comes under scrutiny next week in Agadir, Morocco, where the International Whaling Commission (IWC) discusses a plan to relax a 24-year moratorium on commercial whaling.
Its amazing that if you’ve got a liberal cause to fight that there is a good chance a spookily convenient scientific breakthrough will turn up at just the right moment, eh?
I am all for allowing sperm whales to swim around unmolested but conflating that with climate change really is grasping st straws.
btw, I have been to Agadir and my advice is, don’t.
No Shit!
(sorry, but I couldn’t resist….)
From Gib here I can see Morocco out of the kitchen window and, trust me, I only go there when I have to entertain visitors who want to “see stuff”.
Morocco is the ultimate in “stuff”. Most of it smelling of shit.
Just collect your coat at the door. And a full refund, compliments of the management.