‘It’s death by a thousand cuts’: marine ecologist on the collapse of coral reefs
‘It’s death by a thousand cuts’: marine ecologist on the collapse of coral reefs

‘It’s death by a thousand cuts’: marine ecologist on the collapse of coral reefs

We have recently revised the temperature threshold. Up to 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the tipping point for coral reefs would occur when warming is between 1.5C and 2C above preindustrial levels. But in 2023, we revised that to between 1C and 1.5C. The world is already close to that upper limit and it will certainly come within the next 10 or 20 years as a result of committed climate change – which comes from cumulative emissions that have already gone into the atmosphere. So have we already gone past the tipping point for coral reefs in global terms? Perhaps.
Well, nice one humans /s
As a kid, my family went to the same small island in my home country for holidays every year and even as a kid in the 90s I noticed how year after year, the coral got worse and worse. Made me sad thinking what condition it would be in as I grew up, though I haven't been there in a LONG time.
Knowing this is the story of coral reefs the world over has always been super depressing...