11/07/2006

Australian Climate Insanity

A Sun Umbrella for the Great Barrier Reef

By Franziska Badenschier and Stefan Schmitt

The Great Barrier Reef is fading to white. Increasing water temperatures may spell doom for the region's tourism infrastructure. The government though has a few ideas.

The Australian Minister of Tourism, Fran Bailey is "very concerned." The Great Barrier Reef supports a $5.8 billion tourism industry that provides work to some 33,000 people, she says. But the reef isn't cooperating. Scientists have discovered that, while coral in shady spots on the reef retain their bright colors, those in direct sunlight are beginning to fade. Tourists would surely be disappointed if the Great Barrier Reef's corals were to go pale.

But Bailey has a plan. After the promising results of a two-year-long trial, she wants to erect vast awnings -- essentially oversized sun umbrellas -- to keep the reef from bleaching.

Suggestions such as Bailey's aren't entirely unheard of in Australia. Similar ideas have popped up in the headlines in recent years: awnings on pontoons; firmly anchored umbrella-like structures. No idea has been left unexplored. What is new, though, is government support for such ideas.

Faded corals are old news

"Obviously, we're tackling this issue from both ends," she told the Australian Broadcast Corporation recently, "the cause of the problem and also trying to find very practical ways where we can mitigate the problem." Scientists and the opposition in Canberra have their doubts -- about both ends of the approach.

Rising water temperatures are thought to be responsible for the fading of the coral. The range of temperatures within which coral can survive is narrow: As soon as the water gets too warm, the coral get sick. Even a variation of just one or two degrees Celsius is enough. Coral depend on microscopic algae called zooxanthellae to provide them with sugar and other nutrients. But when the water is too warm, these algae die off.

And when the reddish-brown algae disappear, the coral's characteristic bright colors fade until all that remains is the calcium carbonate skeleton -- a ghostly white frame that doesn't look much like what tourists learn to expect from their travel brochures.

Such whitening of corals takes place regularly, according to Claudio Richter, a coral reef specialist with the Center for Marine Tropical Ecology (ZMT) in Bremen, Germany. Richter told SPIEGEL ONLINE that the phenomenon has been observed before, including near the Australian east coast. He added that coral doesn't necessarily die when its colors fade -- it's only when water temperatures remain too high for too long that its survival is at risk.

Experts are skeptical

"The awning idea may make economic sense for the local tourism business, but from an ecological point of view, and as far as the survival of the reef is concerned, it's meaningless," Katharina Fabricius, an expert on the Great Barrier Reef at the Australian Institute for Marine Science, told SPIEGEL ONLINE. The sheer size of the reef makes it doubtful that a few awnings can keep the water from overheating.

"The idea also doesn't take into account the fact that there are currents," Bremen-based scientist Richter points out. The East Australian Current is constantly feeding the Great Barrier Reef with warm water. Any beneficial effect the awnings might have would be gone.

The Great Barrier Reef is 2,000 kilometres (1,243 miles) long. In geological terms, it's an underwater mountain range. "Sure, you could set up an awning above the roof of the reef," says Richter, "but technically that's not possible." Besides, Richter is convinced the project would cost a fortune. Bailey, the minister of tourism, didn't cite any figures when she made her proposal.

Several intense tropical storms reach the Great Barrier Reef every year. The stronger ones -- like the cyclone "Larry," which hit the reef in March of this year, or "Ingrid," from 2005 -- can do serious damage to the reef. Underwater. It doesn't take much imagination to see what such storms would do to a construction consisting of awnings and metal bars above water. "The first storm would sweep the bars away," Richter believes. "I just can't imagine (the plan) being put into practice," he says.

Sprinklers on the reef?

But other proposals are even more fanciful. The imaginary setup of bars, awnings and pontoons could also include fountains spraying a fog of cool water. The Australian, reports that Andrew Skeat, the managing director of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA), is in favor of regular cold showers for the tourist attraction. Sprayed seawater, he says, could absorb some of the sun's UV ray thus cooling the water below. Skeat says the first pilot projects, undertaken in 2004, were promising.

"Whether it becomes practicable and cost effective is another question,"Skeat admitted to the Australian. What's more, he said, the project doesn't constitute an "ecological scale solution to climate change, but it could be one response to keeping particular areas with high coral cover."

"Solution to climate change." It's a key phrase that is being uttered, and debated, the world over -- especially this week with the UN climate conference getting underway in Nairobi, Kenya. The Great Barrier Reef is an important part of that debate.

The Australian government has been under tremendous pressure since the British government published its Stern Report last Monday. On the very same day that Fran Bailey announced her plan of protecting the Great Barrier Reef with special awnings, Professors Stuart white and Chris Riedy of the Institute for Sustainable Futures at Sydney's University of Technology criticized the government in an article published in the Sydney Morning Herald. They argued that the government needed to treat an agreement on climate protection as a "first priority." They cited "A Clean Energy Future for Australia," a study by the Australian WWF that outlines a plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions Down Under by 2050.

And that is exactly what Nicholas Stern, the economics expert who assessed the results of climate change for the British government, is demanding. Stern's 700-page study predicts that climate change would have grave consequences for the world economy. Ever since then, Australia's conservative administration has been under fire for its persistent refusal to join the Kyoto Protocol.

On the very day the report was published, a back bencher from Australia's governing National Party showed just how out of touch from reality some of the country's politicians really are. Technology is the answer, she said. New technologies would solve humanity's climate-related worries just as cars had gotten rid of the problem of horse manure by eliminating horse-drawn carriages from most roads, De-Anne Kelly claimed.

Anthony Albanese, the speaker on environmental issues in Australia's government opposition, the Labor Party, quickly jumped on the comment. "The Howard Government simply can't be believed when it comes to climate change," he said in an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "They don't think it's a serious issue. The Howard Government is frozen in time, while the globe warms around it."

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