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Exploring oceans -- ocean resources - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Whaling has been going on throughout human history, but for most of its history it was small in scale as humans were only able to hunt smaller whales.
      - In the 19th century the invention of the harpoon gun enabled the hunting of bigger and faster whales. This nearly led to the extincation of some whales specis.
      - Nowadays large ships called factory ships operate on an industrial scale with the ability to process a Blue Whale in 45mins (the Blue Whale is the largest living creature on Earth).
    - - It is estimated that in 2016 and 2017 1,500 whales were hunted, with less then 500 of those whales hunted through traditional whaling.
      - South Atlantic Humpback has seen population recovery in the last 40 years (population growing from 1,000 to 25,000).
      - 6 out of the 13 great whale specis are endagered.
      - The Atlantic Right Whale has seen is population drop below 500.
      - Durring the 20th century 1.5 million whales were killed in the Antarctic ocean.
    - - The IWC is in charge of managing the whale population globally.
      - In 1986 they introduced a memorandum on whaling, however, some countries have ignored this despite signing it (such as Japan).
        
        This memorandum sets limts to how many whale indiginous populations may catch as well with their limits being based on how many they will need to catch to mainitain their culture and what is sustainable.
      - The IWC has also worked to reduce noise pollution in the oceans, reduce the risk of ship strike and marine debris and they have worked to limit climate change.
    - - Whale hunting
        
        Commercial whaling has been banned since the 1986 memorandum.
        
        It is estimated the 20,000 whales have been killed since the memorandum and Japan is the worst offender.
        
        Since 2018 commerical whaling has been legal in Japanese waters.
        
        Almost immdetailtly after the 1986 memorandum was introduced scientific licences to hide commerical whaling. Meat from whales killed for science is frequently sold in markets or given away/sold for low prices.
        
        Japan's whaling fleet sets off twice a year, and until the Internaional Court of Justice ruled it illegal, they could kill more than 900 Minke whales in the Antarctic oceans. However, in the North Pacific they can still kill up to 200 Minke Whales.
        
        Japan's whaling quotas are very high enabling people to catch around 900 Minke whales, this makes these quotas near pointless.
        
        Japan allows any whales caught as by catch to also be sold and this accounts for around half of all whales.
        
        Whale meat conspution has droped from 2kg per person in the 60s to just 50g per person in 2005 (on average).
      - Pollution
        
        The most dangerous pollutants to whales are Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) as they can stop reproduction within whale communities.
        
        Although banned PCBs were legal in the UK until 1987 and this means they have been able to build up in the oceans.
        
        The whale communitity off the coast of Scotland has not produced a calf in the last 20 years (and there are only 8 whales left).
        
        Whales take on pollutants such as PCBs through the consumption of their prey which themselves have managed to eat or absorb them.
        
        We can't remove PCBs from the oceans so the only way to mitiagte this impact is through reducing out consumption of them (globally) and to properly dispose of them once we have used them.
    - - Whale watching
        
        This provides a sustainable, economic use for whales.
        
        in 2009 13 million people went whale watching.
      - Reducing whale injuries
        
        There have been speed restrictions implaced in areas of high whale activity and contuining research into producing warning systems for ships to help protect whales from ship strike.
        
        There is growing work to introduce noise limits on oil and gas operations working out at sea as echolocation is key for whales communication and movement.
        
        To deal with fishing net entaglements:
        
        The IWC encrouge the use of sinking fishing nets as they shouldn't accidently catch whales.
        
        Work is ongoing to prevent the enlargement of fishing nets.
        
        People are removing fishing debris from the oceans.
      - Education
        
        There is a movement to teach people about whales through the use of floating schools such as is done in Dominica, it is hoped these schools will make the children more enviromentally conscious.
      - Protecting ocean habitats
        
        The IFAW (International Foundation for Animal Wealthier) is working to create safe havens for whales. These sancturaires would be located around Austrialia, in the Indian ocean and off the coast of America.
        
        A recent UN agreement could expanded protected to cover 30% of international waters.
      - Rescuing whales from stranding
        
        There are specialised responce teams that help move whales that have become stranded.
        
        There is a move to place pingers that emit a annoying, but harmless high pitch noise that would deter whales from approching the shore.
- - - - Dead organic material decomposes anerobically, this material begins to build up, it is compressed by high levels of pressure and is heated up, the material begins to cook and form oil.
    - - Off-shore oil and gas reserves are found alround the world in the Gulf of Mexico, the Straits of Hormuz and the North Sea.
      - 60% of global oil production is controled by OPEC and the organistions member states hold 40% of global oil reserves.
    - - Pros
        
        Employment opportunities.
        
        Wealth creation (some of the wealthist countries in the world are petroStates).
        
        Provides raw materials for a range of products including plastics and fertilisers.
        
        Oil rigs can act as articfical reefs.
      - Cons
        
        Locsl communties can become over dependent on oil, this is dangerous due to its price volitalty.
        
        Can create large amounts of noise pollution.
        
        Create eye sores.
        
        Can have oil spills.
        
        Bad for the climate.
        
        In the Niger Delta oil spills have cut fish production and created an envrioment so toxic that the life expectancy has droped below 50.
    - - The Gulf of Mexico is crucial to the global oil industry with oil extraction going on in the gulf for the past 70 years.
      - The USA and Mexico runs operations within the Gulf.
        
        4000 oil rigs.
        
        There are 40,000km of oil pipelines criscrossing the ocean floor.
        
        It is home to 45% of the US' oil refiening capacity and 50% of the US' natural gas proscessing.
      - The production of oil in the Gulf is having to occur at lower and lower depths with 75% of US production in the region occuring at a depth of 300m or greater and new wells being discoverd at a depth of 1.5km.
      - A positive multiplier affect has occured with the oil industry providing jobs and this helping develop the economy, however, this makes the local community bound to global oil prices.
        
        In the US there are 240,000 jobs connected with the Gulf.
        
        New Orleans and Huston are among the top ten largest ports in the world for tonange with much of the trade linked to the oil sector.
      - Deepwater Horrizon
        
        In April 2010 the BP oil rig Deepwater Horizon saw its blow-out device fail, realsing large amounts of oil and gas, leading to the deaths of 11 people
        
        It is the largest oil spill in history.
        
        It took 87 days to stop the oil leaking.
        
        Impacts
        
        4.9 million barrels of oil leaked into the oceans. (economic and enviromental)
        
        180,000km2 of the Gulf of Mexico was at one pointed affected by the oil spill. (enviromental)
        
        Fishing had to stop (and fishing was a major source of income) due to fears of pollution (economic).
        
        Tourism took a bad hit as the area got a period of very poor publicity in the media and this led to an increase in unemployment. (economic)
        
        It is believed that the economic changes caused by the link led to an increase in domestic voilence (soical impact).
        
        Responces
        
        Multiple attempts to stop the leak were made.
        
        They tried to close the blow out valvue, but it was to badly damaged.
        
        A large containment box was placed over the leak.
        
        Finally they used a process of top kill where heavy, dense material is poored into the well to block it, although this worked it took many weeks.
        
        Skimming surface oil to remove oil from the water.
        
        Surfave oil was burnt to remove it from the water.
        
        Dispersents that break down the oil into smaller particles were deployed to prevent oil sliks.
        
        Beaches and animals were cleaned.
        
        Recovery
        
        The ecosystem managed to recover quickly with sharks returning to the Gulf of Mexico for the first time in many years and pelicans and seaside sparrows saw no long lasting population changes.
        
        BP have had to pay $300 million in compensation for lost wages and $8 billion in compensation settle out of court.
        
        The question still looms of where all the oil went.
        
        Some oil disolved into the water.
        
        Some evaporuated from the surface.
        
        However it is hard to tell what oil in the Gulf is from Deepwater Horrizon as around 2 million gallons of oil leak naturally into the Gulf every day,
- - - - Sustainable/produces no greenhouse gas emissions.
      - Relaible energy source.
      - Structures used can act as the base of artfical coral reefs.
      - Effective in lower energy coastal enviroments (they also work in higher energy ones).
      - Hydroplants last a long time.
    - - Energy is produced at different levels throughout the day and this may not match the times of demand.
      - Very expensive to develop (due to the cost of constructing resileint enough structures).
      - Not many viable locations.
        
        Need to be close to areas of high energy demand.
        
        Need to be by the coast.
      - Tidal barrages (one of the designs) can collect 'lakes' of pollutants behind them.
      - Turbines can disrupt fish movements.
      - Limits shipping/can't be constructed in areas of high shippin density.
      - Can be an eyesore.
  - - - Green energy source/sustainable.
      - Not limited by seasons.
      - Predicatable.
      - The industry is developing and innovating.
      - If sucessful then it could generate more energy then tidal power.
    - - It isn't currently commerically viable as plants can't be constructed in the highest energy enviroments as they get destroyed.
      - Is only an option for coastal countries.
      - Can disrupt ecosystems.
        
        Construction can destroy habitats.
        
        Creates noise pollution.
        
        Can interfere with animals ability to hunt prey.
      - Wave production drops durring rough seas.
- - - - In 2017 Japan began a test mine on a hydrothermal vent near Okinawa which anagered many conservationsits because most hydrothermal vents do not grow back and so when mined they 'die'.
      - Hyrdothermal vents are unlikely to be mined first as they are harder to access then mineral depsoits on the sea bed called nodules.
  - - - Oceanic metal deposits are usally higher quality then surface deposits.
        
        Copper depsoits on land are around 4% copper, while oceanic copper depsoits are around 40% copper.
      - REEs are crucail for the development of green technology.
        
        By 2050 cobolt and nickel demand is set to be 4 times greater then the land based supply of those metals.
      - Minning on land deposits has its own drawbacks.
        
        On land mines create eyesorses.
        
        On land mines can leak chemicals into the water cycle.
        
        Lots of child labour is used in mineral minning.
    - - We could loose/kill specises we never new existed.
        
        Many specis that could be lost may be very valuable for the development of new medcines (such as Ocean Sponges which could contain many natural anti-biotics).
      - It is harder to mine minerals in the oceans.
      - Could disrupt local ecosystems and the damage done may have a knock on effect on the oceans role in the carbon cycle.
      - Mining hydrothermal vents means destorying them.
      - Hydrothermal vents are very hard to mine due to the immense heat around them.