WWF opposes plan to dump 500 tons of urea into Sulu Sea

An international environmental group opposed Friday an Australian geo-engineering firm's plan to dump some 500 tons of toxic urea into Sulu Sea, which it described as the heart of the earth’s Coral Triangle. The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) said Australia-based Ocean Nourishment Corp. recently claimed to get the go-signal to release 500 tons of granulated urea for a large-scale carbon sequestration and ocean fertilization experiment. "WWF urges extreme caution in testing this unproven and potentially-risky technology in natural marine ecosystems, especially in critical biodiversity areas such as the Sulu Sea, home to some of our richest fishing grounds and the Tubbataha Reefs, a World Heritage Site," it said in a statement on its Web site. It also urged government to carefully evaluate the possible impacts of ONC’s planned urea dump "to avert a possible environmental disaster," noting a further 1000-tonne urea dump is planned for Malaysian waters next year. Under the experiment, massive amounts of urea will be dumped into nutrient-poor sites. A pressurized hose situated 50-meters below the sea will release the mixture directly into sunlit-layers where photosynthetic plankton thrive. The premise is that urea, acting like plant fertilizer, would induce algal blooms. But WWF said urea and nitrogen runoff from agricultural lands have historically been known to cause toxic algal blooms such as red tide. It added complex factors such as temperature and chemical reactions can complicate everything from the size of the algal bloom that might intrude into shallow waters to choke off light-dependent animals like corals, to the ecosystem’s species composition that can upset the natural balance and distort the food chain. “The potential environmental impact of dumping 500-tonnes of urea into the sea is just too great ... Leaving potential negative impacts to speculation is not only scientifically unsound – it is morally irresponsible," warned WWF Energy Policy Coordinator Rafael Senga. Urea is an organic compound commercially derived from ammonia and carbon dioxide. Large quantities of carbon dioxide are produced in the manufacture of ammonia from coal or petroleum-based raw materials. It added ONC is a private company spun out of the University of Sydney's Ocean Technology Group, and intends to gain both carbon credits and fish production revenue by licensing its technology to provoke massive plankton blooms in the world’s oceans. Last June the London Convention's scientific advisory body warned that a large-scale plan to fertilize an area near the Galapagos isles using iron particles was environmentally risky and lacked science-based assurance of success. Even the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that toxic tides and lifeless oceans might instead result from such climate-manipulation strategies. “We should be wary of quick-fix solutions such as this to mitigate climate change. The most effective and proven climate solution is the reduction of carbon dioxide emission from energy use and deforestation. Risky schemes such as this urea dumping experiment will only detract us from real solutions to solve the climate crisis," Senga said. WWF Tawi-Tawi project manager Filemon Romero added this is a huge concern for them since they have been actively engaged in the environmental management of the area for years. "This will surely have damaging environmental impacts on the Sulu and Celebes Seas. Moreover, over-fertilization of the sea would have adverse impacts on our seaweed farms, the main source of livelihood for the people. Think about it: tens of millions of people depend on the Sulu Sea for food – you cannot just experiment with their lives," Romero said. - GMANews.TV