Question

What are corals? What is meant by a "coral reef"?

How has climate change affected the Great Barrier Reef in Australia? What are the problems and the causes of these problems?

What is meant by "global climate change"? How is global climate change related to the greenhouse effect and greenhouse gases? What are some of the greenhouse gases?

Answer 1

Corals are marine inverteberates. They are tiny organisms belonging to the phylum Cnidaria. Corals usually live together as colorful colonies which are called as coral reefs. Coral reefs are underwater ecosystems that are held together by calcium carbobonates secreted by the corals.

The climatic change will lead to increase in the temperature of oceans which in turn causes bleaching of coral reefs. Algal blooms will lead to decreased penetration of light and changes the ecosystem of coral reefs. The increased dissolution of carbon dioxide in ocean waters will lead to its acidification and changes its pH. This decreases the structural integerity of coral reefs.

Because of increased use of carbon fuels, there has been an steady increase in the release of methane, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and water vapour into the atmosphere. All these are green house gases as they trap the heat from sun from escaping from the earth's surface. This will lead to increase in global temperature and global warming. This is known as green house effect.