Evizda

Coral reefs off of the Western Australian coast are in extreme peril due to “unprecedented” ocean temperatures caused by climate change, a report released Tuesday by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) warns.

While ocean temperatures fluctuate over the years, both the highs and lows have consistently reached new heights in the Indian Ocean where the scientists did their research. The period since 1980 has been “the warmest period with highest sea levels” in the waters off of the West Australia coast since records began in 1795.

An effect of this warming is an event known as coral bleaching, which often leads to the death of coral ecosystems.

“Indian Ocean warming towards the end of the twenty-first century could potentially increase coral bleaching risk,” the report warns, “and affect maintenance of the current diverse high-latitude coral reef ecosystem and associated fisheries.”

“We were hoping that West Australia … still had some time to react or adapt to the changes,” AIMS scientist Dr. Jens Zinke told the Guardian. “But we’re now seeing all these heatwaves. It’s not that change is going to come, it’s that change is already happening.”

“We’ve crossed this line where coral bleaching can now occur on a large scale,” he warned.

The realization that coral reefs are already facing extreme peril in the the face of global warming comes as the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its groundbreaking report Monday, warning that climate change is already decimating life on the planet, with the worst effects yet to come.