The Baltic Sea, cooling of rivers and streams and the cultivation of coral reefs

According to specialists from the Commission for the Protection of the Baltic Marine Environment, also known as the Helsinki Commission (HELCOM), the Baltic Sea faces “critical challenges” from climate change and biodiversity degradation. Fish stocks are deficient, and human activities – overfishing, pollution, habitat destruction, land use and resource extraction – continue to pressure the marine ecosystem. The problem is eutrophication – an excess of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus, causing algae blooms. Despite the efforts made, the condition of the Baltic Sea waters has improved little or not at all in recent years.

How to save coral reefs? Among others, thanks to the breeding of Maguimithrax spinosissimus crabs, which eat seaweed growing on corals. Like volunteers from the Earthwatch Institute, you can also dive and manually pluck seaweed from coral reefs. Growing in the laboratory calcium carbonate – micro-fragments of the skeletons of dead reefs, and then transplanting it onto the skeletons of reefs in the ocean brings dead ecosystems back to life. Artificial sea fog can also be produced using huge nozzles mounted on ships. It protects corals from excessive sunlight and prevents them from fading.

Scientists are developing methods to artificially cool Canada’s increasingly warmer rivers and streams to help Atlantic salmon migrate from the ocean to freshwater spawning grounds. The first option is to redirect part of the river’s flow through an underground ditch, allowing the water to cool before returning to the mainstream. The second method involves actively pumping cold groundwater from wells into rivers.