Some 290 shipwrecks lie in the Belgian part of the North Sea alone, with probably more than 1,000 in the entire North Sea, many of them silent witnesses to the two world wars. Until recently, the environmental impact of these wrecks was largely unknown and, as far as the presence of munitions is concerned, they represented a true Pandora’s box. The North Sea Wrecks project has changed this. Researchers examined the munitions and the possible release of toxic substances from a few selected wrecks in the North Sea. Are these wrecks really leaving us with a toxic legacy of war, or are we worrying about nothing? In this article, we try to discover the answer.
The ocean has long taken the brunt of the impacts of human-made global warming, says UN Climate Change. As the planet’s greatest carbon sink, the ocean absorbs excess heat and energy released from rising greenhouse gas emissions trapped in the Earth’s system. Today, the ocean has absorbed about 90 percent of the heat generated by rising emissions.
As the excessive heat and energy warms the ocean, the change in temperature leads to unparalleled cascading effects, including ice-melting, sea-level rise, marine heatwaves, and ocean acidification.
These changes ultimately cause a lasting impact on marine biodiversity, and the lives and livelihoods of coastal communities and beyond - including around 680 million people living in low-lying coastal areas, almost 2 billion who live in half of