What can YOU personally do to help coral reefs?

[TCoach]

So, if you are on this forum/website, you obviously love salt water fish and corals. After watching a lot of documentaries about the worlds coral reefs and the state of the oceans, I realize that they need help. I don't want to start a Global Warming/Non-Global Warming debate, but more a constructive discussion on how we as individuals can help with this issue.

Let's be honest. Most of us live our daily lives and there does not seem to be much we can do to influence Coral Reefs/Oceans that are 100-1000's of miles away. However, is that true? What can I/You do as individuals to help improve this situation?

I personally have learned that the CO2 levels in my house can dramatically impact the pH in my tank. There are 8 of us and with the house closed up and everyone home, the CO2 levels can climb close to 2000ppm. Now I try and keep a window open exhausting the house air along with using an aquarium air pump to push low CO2 air into my reef. Keeping the CO2 low has allowed me to keep my tank at a pH of +8. . So I have seen first hand the effects of elevated CO2 on salt water.

Reducing CO2 is one thing I have realized, but how? I still need to eat, drive, etc, and of course, holding my breath only leads to passing out and breathing resuming . Finances don't allow the purchase of an electric car, and personally, I don't know of any that could handle my larger family. We can always get better at recycling plastics and metals, but it is pretty much impossible to avoid them. I'm looking into solar panels for my house, but that is still in its infancy.

So what can one family/person do to help solve/impact the Coral Reef bleaching and other issues we face with our oceans? What do you do to help with these issues? Can each of us doing something add up to any real impact?

(from Chasing Coral)

 

[Lyss]

So, if you are on this forum/website, you obviously love salt water fish and corals. After watching a lot of documentaries about the worlds coral reefs and the state of the oceans, I realize that they need help. I don't want to start a Global Warming/Non-Global Warming debate, but more a constructive discussion on how we as individuals can help with this issue.

Let's be honest. Most of us live our daily lives and there does not seem to be much we can do to influence Coral Reefs/Oceans that are 100-1000's of miles away. However, is that true? What can I/You do as individuals to help improve this situation?

I personally have learned that the CO2 levels in my house can dramatically impact the pH in my tank. There are 8 of us and with the house closed up and everyone home, the CO2 levels can climb close to 2000ppm. Now I try and keep a window open exhausting the house air along with using an aquarium air pump to push low CO2 air into my reef. Keeping the CO2 low has allowed me to keep my tank at a pH of +8. . So I have seen first hand the effects of elevated CO2 on salt water.

Reducing CO2 is one thing I have realized, but how? I still need to eat, drive, etc, and of course, holding my breath only leads to passing out and breathing resuming . Finances don't allow the purchase of an electric car, and personally, I don't know of any that could handle my larger family. We can always get better at recycling plastics and metals, but it is pretty much impossible to avoid them. I'm looking into solar panels for my house, but that is still in its infancy.

So what can one family/person do to help solve/impact the Coral Reef bleaching and other issues we face with our oceans? What do you do to help with these issues? Can each of us doing something add up to any real impact?

(from Chasing Coral)

I think this is the age-old question: What can one as an individual do? I went through periods of my life trying to do everything I could think of to contribute positively, including not eating meat, and now eating less meat (that's a big one, BTW), but I settled on the need to get involved as either an activist, or in mainstream politics.

I ended up finding a job where I get to work on campaigns that raise awareness and influence others to put pressure on lawmakers. There are a lot of great non-profits working in this specific space, so picking the ones you like and align with most, and then supporting them any way you are able, is one great way to begin to get more involved.

 

[LRT]

Spent some time on gulf reef over the summer with one of the guys heading up the effort to save gulf reef.
Truth is at the end of the day 1st) We really need to know whats actually killing the reefs. Fact is they are absoloutely dumb founded whats killing off the corals but they are losing the reef at an alarming rate at 40% in last 5 years! Corals just dieing as well as Stopped propagating in the wild and there is no definitive answer to WHY?
What can we do? Get yourself a reef tank going and preserve whatever corals you can get your hands on now and until they are gone. At the rate gulf reef is dieing it may have another 6 years to go?
By the way id highly reccomend if you haven't had the opportunity to do so bring your family out to swim with whale sharks and mantas while you still have a chance. Once the reefs gone they stop migrating.

 

[Brucealmighty]

Is it just me or am I being stupid? If they made it law for both solar power panels and wind turbine generators to be fitted to new buildings, homes and industrial alike, within a short time the mass effect of generating energy would make the power stations irrelevant as newer profit/surplus energy making generators are produced for said buildings?, and present buildings are upgraded / updated? Unfortunately I don't know if this were to happen tomorrow wether it would make a difference when farming is the most important fact driving up climate change and that's a whole different subject area sub paragraph etc

As for what we can do as reefers keep our tanks swinging because the corals we make super resilient to these conditions will be the corals we re plant the reefs with me thinks, that and switch our power supply from mains to solar /wind for our tanks would work too

 

[jcdeng]

Not buying wild caught stuff.

 

[damsels are not mean]

Buying wild/maricultured corals and fish collected by sustainable fisheries. I prefer to buy local and captive bred mainly because they tend to do better in tank and biosecurity reasons, but if I wanted to support the reef I would actually buy from reputable farmers in areas where the local community supports and benefits.

But let's be real about the economics on this. For many people in areas where our fish are collected, it's either fish for money or food or illegally mine coral for limestone, or do some terrestrial and unsustainable (in that environment) jobs like farming with the help of fertilizers that can damage the reef.

Collecting a few fish (which are abundant if the fishery is managed) for the hobby and selling them for wayyyy more than they could sell a food fish allows people to make more money and means less food fishing (which is generally much worse). Similarly for corals, live, sustainably collected ones are worth a lot more per pound and per hour of work than dead skeletons.

Communities that have mariculture and sustainable harvesting as a money input have an incentive rather than a disincentive to support and maintain their reefs, which also results in better yields for the food fishing too. Food fisherman must compete and race to the bottom to push out product while coral farmers cut and propagate the 1 out of 50 strains of each coral on the reef. Remember that most coral strains are too ugly and brown (to most) to sell to the hobby, meanwhile all corals are under the chopping block if you want to collect their skeletons.

 

[MaxTremors]

Is it just me or am I being stupid? If they made it law for both solar power panels and wind turbine generators to be fitted to new buildings, homes and industrial alike, within a short time the mass effect of generating energy would make the power stations irrelevant as newer profit/surplus energy making generators are produced for said buildings?, and present buildings are upgraded / updated? Unfortunately I don't know if this were to happen tomorrow wether it would make a difference when farming is the most important fact driving up climate change and that's a whole different subject area sub paragraph etc

As for what we can do as reefers keep our tanks swinging because the corals we make super resilient to these conditions will be the corals we re plant the reefs with me thinks, that and switch our power supply from mains to solar /wind for our tanks would work too

The problem is that there’s really no such thing as ‘green energy’, even solar panels and wind turbines rely on rare earth metals that create a ton of CO2 and other pollution to mine and refine. The real answer is, and I know this isn’t popular, using less power and lowering the population.

 

[LegalReefer]

The problem is that there’s really no such thing as ‘green energy’, even solar panels and wind turbines rely on rare earth metals that create a ton of CO2 and other pollution to mine and refine. The real answer is, and I know this isn’t popular, using less power and lowering the population.

Or transitioning to Nuclear power, making use of breeder reactors for spent fuel so it’s almost 100% renewable, and using the one power source that is super high yield and effective, with minimal impact comparatively and with a (roughly) workable eroi

 

[KrisReef]

The problem is that there’s really no such thing as ‘green energy’, even solar panels and wind turbines rely on rare earth metals that create a ton of CO2 and other pollution to mine and refine. The real answer is, and I know this isn’t popular, using less power and lowering the population.

Lowering the population does seem like a realistic way to to minimize future pressure from man's domination of the planet. It's the selection of the survivors that causes the rub. I mean who is the master race that should be chosen to live on and who should be eliminated? I might be ok with the answers to those questions just as long as I am the one who gets to make those critical decisions. I mean really, who better than me to decide on how to move forward with population reductions. ("Please step to the left, thank you.")

Or transitioning to Nuclear power, making use of breeder reactors for spent fuel so it’s almost 100% renewable, and using the one power source that is super high yield and effective, with minimal impact comparatively and with a (roughly) workable eroi

Everyone who agrees with my first comment above will likely think that LegalReefer is way too dangerous of a person, as demonstrated by the discussion of a "clean nuclear future," to be allowed to continue into any safe and sane future?

And this seems to be how the lines get drawn. Peace and Love elude us on this mean planet because we think it is up to us to save it. I'm ok thinking that we can't and don't really need too save the planet. (And this puts me in the same line as LegalReefer, way too dangerous for the future.)

The end is near!
Nearer than when you began and just around the corner.
Stop it if you can but its come for everyone before you.

 

[mottomegl]

Is it just me or am I being stupid? If they made it law for both solar power panels and wind turbine generators to be fitted to new buildings, homes and industrial alike, within a short time the mass effect of generating energy would make the power stations irrelevant as newer profit/surplus energy making generators are produced for said buildings?, and present buildings are upgraded / updated? Unfortunately I don't know if this were to happen tomorrow wether it would make a difference when farming is the most important fact driving up climate change and that's a whole different subject area sub paragraph etc

As for what we can do as reefers keep our tanks swinging because the corals we make super resilient to these conditions will be the corals we re plant the reefs with me thinks, that and switch our power supply from mains to solar /wind for our tanks would work too

 

[BroccoliFarmer]

Lowering the population does seem like a realistic way to to minimize future pressure from man's domination of the planet. It's the selection of the survivors that causes the rub. I mean who is the master race that should be chosen to live on and who should be eliminated? I might be ok with the answers to those questions just as long as I am the one who gets to make those critical decisions. I mean really, who better than me to decide on how to move forward with population reductions. ("Please step to the left, thank you.")

Everyone who agrees with my first comment above will likely think that LegalReefer is way too dangerous of a person, as demonstrated by the discussion of a "clean nuclear future," to be allowed to continue into any safe and sane future?

And this seems to be how the lines get drawn. Peace and Love elude us on this mean planet because we think it is up to us to save it. I'm ok thinking that we can't and don't really need too save the planet. (And this puts me in the same line as LegalReefer, way too dangerous for the future.)

The end is near!
Nearer than when you began and just around the corner.
Stop it if you can but its come for everyone before you.

 

[Bruce Burnett]

The problem is that there’s really no such thing as ‘green energy’, even solar panels and wind turbines rely on rare earth metals that create a ton of CO2 and other pollution to mine and refine. The real answer is, and I know this isn’t popular, using less power and lowering the population.

So what is to be done about population. In most of Europe birth rates are lower than death rates. In the US it is almost even. The entire EU is about same population as the US. China and India each is about 4 times the population of the US. I don't want to bring religion into it but in the US average couple has around 2 children while Muslins have average of 14 children. Even though birth control and abortion are against catholic religion most use some form of birth control and to many use abortions. The push for green energy is to reduce air pollution and the major portion is not the US neither is ocean pollution. The US is only country that was meeting reductions of the Paris accord even when not part of it.

 

[Jekyl]

There's plenty of talk about global warming and going green. Never a discussion of how much trash is dumped in the ocean on a regular and perfectly legal basis. Fixing things if there is a solution at all, won't happen. Sad, but probably true.

 

[mottomegl]

Wind turbines are big pollters they constatly need oil changed they kill 100 of birds if over water they can pollute the water not to mention they produce almost no power i have 80 solar panels on my house and they don’t produce much electric plus they are clearing forest after forest for solar so they are doi more damage to the environment these whole green energy thing and global warming is a money making scam research the warmest summer around the us most of the warmest smummer days were from the 40s to the early 90s since the summers have cooled also after diving around the world i have seen no real signs of seas rising rember at one point most of earth was under water that is how we have some of these island that were formed from coral reefs florida keys are a example the best way to produce power is nuclear it is the cleanest form of production research it as for electric cars and and sort they are not saving the environment the batteries need replacement plus most power in the us is produced from coal or natural gas

 

[mottomegl]

I am in the south pacif now and they had some bleaching of reefs in Tahiti a few years ago and they just discovered another reef that was untouched from the bleaching and i have been diving reefs around here some have damage some don’t there is no true research done that shows why these happens cause unfortunately most research done is finaced by money that wants a certain narrative and some of the good research is sweept under the rug cause it goes against there narrative the first thing that needs to happen is take politics and money out of anything to do with the environment and watch how the story changes

 

[jcolliii]

Only buy captive bred fish and tank-propagated corals and inverts.

Recycle everything you can. We're going to be building an off grid house - and yes, you can do it with solar even up here in ND, but we'll augment with wind. Actually not hard to do at all, with proper design, site placement, building techniques and hyper insulation of not only the house but the largest energy using appliances in it - like the fridge. More people that move off grid and maintenance of the grid becomes more and more expensive for those who remain attached.

 

[davidcalgary29]

Clean up your trash, and dispose of it responsibly; don't litter; pick up trash when you visit a tropical country instead of lazing and lolling around on the beach. When I was a kid in the Bahamas, you had to wear shoes on the beach because your feet would get coated by the tar that formed from the oil slicks dumped by passing tankers, washing over the barrier reefs and making swimming an unpleasant business. And this was on an island far, far away from the national capitol.

Thankfully, that's much less of a problem now, but so much plastic trash washes up on the garbage on the windward sides of islands that it's replacing oolitic rock as the dominant component of dunes. The North Atlantic gyre is just as much of a garbage pit as the one in the Pacific, but it gets much less attention.

 

[PeterEde]

Personally I think we should be burning as much waste as we can in high temp furnaces with CO2 capture.
We bury far too much waste today. Recycle where possible and burn what should not go to landfill.
Having said that most of Australia's recycle used to be shipped off to Mayasia and other parts who have since decided importing garbage was counter productive. Now where we say we recycle much is just dumped in landfill.
My state has 10cent deposit on all recyclable commercial plastic and cardboard drink containers/bottles. From soft drink to fruit juice and milk. I just hope it is actually being recycled

 

[PeterEde]

Wind turbines are big pollters they constatly need oil changed they kill 100 of birds if over water they can pollute the water not to mention they produce almost no power i have 80 solar panels on my house and they don’t produce much electric plus they are clearing forest after forest for solar so they are doi more damage to the environment these whole green energy thing and global warming is a money making scam research the warmest summer around the us most of the warmest smummer days were from the 40s to the early 90s since the summers have cooled also after diving around the world i have seen no real signs of seas rising rember at one point most of earth was under water that is how we have some of these island that were formed from coral reefs florida keys are a example the best way to produce power is nuclear it is the cleanest form of production research it as for electric cars and and sort they are not saving the environment the batteries need replacement plus most power in the us is produced from coal or natural gas

Both Solar and Wind being green is a myth. People forget the intense mining and processing that goes into producing both.

 

[PeterEde]

Or transitioning to Nuclear power, making use of breeder reactors for spent fuel so it’s almost 100% renewable, and using the one power source that is super high yield and effective, with minimal impact comparatively and with a (roughly) workable eroi

Australia has the largest known resource of uranium and Thorium in the world yet we don't use it. We have a ban on using the cleanest and safest form of power we have today.
Mean while we destroy coal and gas plants to cover this great land in eyesore solar panels and even uglier wind farms that produce intermittent power.
A few years back we even had a state wide blackout due to failure of wind.