![]() There are more than 400 known dead zones worldwide, covering about 1 percent of the area of the continental shelves. A handful of the 166 dead zones have since bounced back through improved management of sewage and agricultural runoff, but as fertilizer use and factory farming increase, we are creating dead zones faster than nature can recover. Coastal waters contain the vast majority, though some exist in inland waterways. ![]() After reviewing the academic literature on “hypoxic zones” in 2012, Robert Diaz, professor emeritus at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science at the College of William and Mary, identified 166 reports of dead zones in the country. Which makes you wonder… How many other dead zones are out there? Caused largely by nutrient runoff from farm fertilizer, this oxygen-deprived “dead zone” is approximately the size of Connecticut.Īlthough slightly smaller than last summer’s edition, the Gulf dead zone is still touted by some as the largest in the United States and costs $82 million annually in diminished tourism and fishing yield. Warmer water holds less oxygen, and the researchers found that 94 percent of the world's dead zones are in areas expected to see a temperature rise of 2 degrees Celsius or more by the end of the century.Ī stretch of the Gulf of Mexico spanning more than 5,000 square miles along the Louisiana coast is nearly devoid of marine life this summer, according to a study released this week. Climate change is likely to make existing ocean dead ader, according to a new study by the Smithsonian. ![]()
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