Environmental Group Requests "Impaired" Designation For Acidified Atlantic & Pacific Oceans

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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — A conservation organization has requested that Hawai'i and six other states add bodies of water to their list of impaired waterways: the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. The Center for Biological Diversity, based in San Francisco, requested that Hawai'i, Alaska, Washington and Oregon list the Pacific Ocean as impaired under the federal Clean Water Act. The group wants New York, New Jersey and Florida to list the Atlantic.

The reason: ocean acidification, the changing of seawater chemistry because of absorption of carbon dioxide produced by humans. A center attorney, Miyoko Sakashita, said listing the oceans as impaired under the Clean Water Act would allow states to set limits on the discharge of pollutants. Lynda Giguere, spokeswoman for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, said neither Commissioner Larry Hartig nor Division of Water Director Lynn Kent had seen the request yesterday. Alaska periodically reviews such requests, she said, and this one will be considered in a process allowing public comment.

The ocean's absorption of CO2 is quietly and lethally altering its fundamental chemistry, Sakashita said. "We must act now to prevent global warming's evil twin, ocean acidification, from destroying our ocean ecosystems," she said.

A similar petition was submitted in California in February. A comprehensive national policy to curb greenhouse gas emissions would be preferable, Sakashita said.

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