Brussels, 16/02/2007 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) has drafted a report that looks at the impact of climate change and human activity on European coastal waters and seas. It also highlights the gaps in current scientific and technological knowledge concerning climate-related incidents, and puts forward recommendations to remedy this. The report stresses that any policy aimed at alleviating the impact of climate change should take into account Man's exploitation of coastal waters and seas, in order to ensure sustainable management of marine resources. The report was presented at the Climate Change and European Water Dimension symposium organised in Berlin on 12 - 14 February by the German EU presidency.
There is an increasing amount of scientific proof that climate change and variability will have an effect on coastal habitats and seas, and the JRC report entitled “Marine and Coastal Dimension of Climate Change in Europe: A report to the European Water Directors”, clearly indicates that European waters are not spared. Results of research work conducted by international experts under the coordination of JRC demonstrate that global warming affects the different European ecosystems in various ways. The temperature of northern waters has evolved differently to those of the Mediterranean. In some areas around Scotland, water temperatures have increased by around 1°C over the past 20 years, while the change in the Mediterranean is closer to 0.5°C. Changes of sea level also vary - from 0.8 mm to 3.0 mm per year according to the report. These variations of sea level affect other critical processes, such as tides, the extent of sea ice, evaporation and various tectonic developments, such as the rising up of land masses due to glacial melting, which, according to the report, requires unremitting attention and permanent surveillance. The report examines how variations of prolonged environmental pressure, for example, the rise in greenhouse gas emissions, higher surface temperature and the rise in the sea level, etc, can cause a higher frequency of extreme climatic episodes (torrential rain, drought, storm surges and flooding), with considerable human and environmental costs. To quote just one example, the report shows that the frequency of winter storms and extreme weather conditions has doubled over the past 50 years in the northern regions of the United Kingdom.
The report shows in particular that climate change has modified water characteristics and circulation, the carbon cycle and the carbonate system (acidification), if not whole ecosystems, forcing warm water species to move northward, thus leading to a decline in cold water species. For example, the dominant species of marine zooplankton has fallen 70% since the 1960s following a rise in water temperature which - together with overfishing - has brought about an indepth change in the structure of North Sea fish species, with almost total disappearance of cod, a major economic fish population. The other environmental changes covered by the report concern phenological perturbations and a mismatch between trophic levels and functional groups, coastal recession and erosion along the western European coast as a result of sea level rise and storm surges, coastal floods and other environmental disasters as a result of tidal/storm surges.
The report also tackles the problem of the human pressure put on European coasts. It points out that human activity - for ever growing - has an adverse impact on marine habitats. The authors of the report cite fishing, energy production, trade and tourism among the human activities that modify marine environments. Anthropogenic pressure can also worsen the effect of climate change by reducing the ability of marine and coastal systems to recover from damage, leaving them still more vulnerable to face climatic forcing. The complete report can be downloaded from: http: //ies.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ (oj)