Ocean

UN agrees high seas treaty to protect ocean life in international waters

Guterres in a statement stated, "This action is a victory for multilateralism and for global efforts to counter the destructive trends facing ocean ocean health, now and for generations to come"

United Nations ocean treaty talks resume with goal to save biodiversity

United Nations members gather Monday in New York to resume efforts to forge a long-awaited and elusive treaty to safeguard the world's marine biodiversity. Nearly two-thirds of the ocean lies outside national boundaries on the high seas where fragmented and unevenly enforced rules seek to minimise human impacts. The goal of the U.N. meetings, running through March 3, is to produce a unified agreement for the conservation and sustainable use of those vast marine ecosystems. The talks, formally called the Intergovernmental Conference on Marine Biodiversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction, resume negotiations suspended last fall without agreement on a final treaty. The ocean is the life support system of our planet, said Boris Worm, a marine biologist at Canada's Dalhousie University. For the longest time, we did not feel we had a large impact on the high seas. But that notion has changed with expansion of deep sea fishing, mining, plastic pollution, climate change, and other hu

All at sea

The impact of warming oceans is a neglected threat

Centre to come out with 'Blue Economy' policy soon for ocean resources

The Centre is likely to come out with a 'Blue Economy' policy, aimed at harnessing ocean resources, in the next couple of months, a senior official said on Friday. The contribution of 'Blue Economy' to the country's GDP currently stands at approximately four per cent and the policy aims to increase it to double digits by 2047, M Ravichandran, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, told PTI here. "...how do we harness ocean resources for the country's economic growth? This is the objective of the proposed policy," he said. The government had earlier rolled out the draft blue economy policy in the public domain, inviting suggestions and inputs from various stakeholders. The senior official was speaking on the sidelines of a seminar on 'Recent trends in space sector: New India' organised by the Academy for Science, Technology and Communication, Hyderabad jointly with National Academy of Sciences, India - Hyderabad Chapter. Telangana Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan, who was the chief

WRI, GEF to form Secretariat for preservation of 30% land, ocean by 2030

The High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People has announced the formation of a new permanent Secretariat to be co-hosted by World Resources Institute and the Global Environment Facility

Nearly 200 nations adopt key biodiversity pact to protect 30% lands, oceans

The pact includes measures deemed critical to addressing the dangerous loss of biodiversity and restoring natural ecosystems

US-France launch satellite to map the world's oceans, lakes, rivers

A US-French satellite that will map almost all of the world's oceans, lakes and rivers rocketed into orbit Friday. The predawn launch aboard a SpaceX rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California capped a highly successful year for NASA. Nicknamed SWOT short for Surface Water and Ocean Topography the satellite is needed more than ever as climate change worsens droughts, flooding and coastal erosion, according to scientists. "We're going to be able to see things that we could just not see before ... and really understand where water is at any given time, said Benjamin Hamlington at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. About the size of an SUV, the satellite will measure the height of water on more than 90 per cent of Earth's surface, allowing scientists to track the flow and identify potential high-risk areas. It will also survey millions of lakes as well as 1.3 million miles (2.1 million kilometres) of rivers, from headwater to mouth. The satellite w

Convention on the Law of the Sea more relevant than ever: UN chief Guterres

As the ocean is "in dire straits," the landmark UN Convention on the Law of the Sea adopted 40 years ago is more relevant than ever, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said

IIT Madras generates power from sea waves, aims to go commercial by 2024

Innovation may help India achieve climate change-related goal of generating 500 Gw of renewable energy by 2030

COP15 goals to halt biodiversity decline but can downgrade ocean action

The UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) or COP15 is the long-awaited conference to finally set the new post-Aichi goals to halt and reverse global biodiversity decline

Nord Stream explosions show the deep sea is now a zone of conflict

The series of pipeline explosions have yet to be definitively proved as sabotage or attributed to any nation, but most analysts believe that the likely culprit is Russia.

Tropical Storm Fiona, 6th named storm of season, forms in Atlantic Ocean

Tropical Storm Fiona, the season's sixth named storm, formed in the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday evening and forecasters at the US National Hurricane Center issued tropical storm warnings for several islands. Tropical Storm Fiona was located about 650 miles (1,046 kilometers) east of the Leeward Islands, and tropical storm watches were issued for Saba and St. Eustatius, St. Maarten, Antigua, Barbuda, St. Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat, and Anguilla, forecasters said. Interests in the Leeward Islands, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico should monitor the progress of this system," the agency said. At 11 pm EDT, the depression was moving at 16 mph (26 kph) with maximum sustained winds of about 50 mph (85 kph), forecasters said. On the forecast track, the center of the system is forecast to move through the Leeward Islands on Friday or Friday night and be near the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico this weekend," the hurricane center advisory said.

Artificially cooling water to decrease hurricanes ineffective, finds study

The scientists combined air-sea interaction theories with a highly advanced computer model of the atmosphere

Explained: NASA postpones Artemis 1 launch; here's what we know so far

Artemis 1 was supposed to orbit the moon, deploy some satellites, and settle into the orbit. It was meant to test SLS rocket and the Orion crew capsule

Samudrayaan: India's first mission to send humans 6,000 metre deep in ocean

Samudrayaan Mission is aimed to develop a self-propelled manned submersible which will allow scientific personnel to observe and understand unexplored deep-sea areas by direct interventions.

UN calls for implementing faster steps to secure critical ocean health

A United Nations conference warned Friday that measures needed to protect the world's oceans are lagging and urged countries to accelerate their implementation

'Save our Ocean, Protect our Future': UN Ocean Conference begins Monday

United Nations Ocean Conference is set to take place in Lisbon, Portugal from June 27-July 1 and will be co-hosted by the Governments of Kenya and Portugal

Envoy urges ASEAN, Australia, India to work for ocean health, smart ports

Speaking at the inaugural session, Australia's High Commissioner to India Barry O'Farrell also stressed the need to co-operate in the Indo-Pacific amid the rising multi-polar world scenario

Ocean resources key to India's future economy, says Jitendra Singh

He said India has emerged as one of the frontline nations in marine scientific research

A sea of problems

Before the era of industrialisation, the oceans actually released more carbon into the atmosphere than they took in