Deep Dives
Thought-provoking research providing extensive learning opportunities
The Blue Economy and the United Nations’ sustainable development goals: Challenges and opportunities
Lee, KH et al., Environment International Energy Solutions Fisheries & Aquaculture Plastics & Pollution Shipping & Ports Tourism
The “Blue Economy (BE)” is an increasingly popular concept as a strategy for safeguarding the world’s oceans and water resources. It may emerge when economic activity is in balance with the long term capacity of ocean ecosystems to support the activity in a sustainable manner.
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Jouffray, J.P. et al., One Earth
Does humanity's future lie in the ocean? As demand for resources continues to grow and land-based sources decline, expectations for the ocean as an engine of human development are increasing.
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Credit Suisse and Responsible Investor BrightTalk GreenMoney
In addition to being the largest natural carbon sink on the planet, our ocean is a tremendous source of economic livelihoods for billions of people. The value of global ocean assets is estimated at over US$24 trillion -- making it the seventh largest economy in the world in GDP terms.Read more → (more than 30 minute read)
McKinsey Global Institute
How could Earth's changing climate impact socioeconomic systems across the world in the next three decades? A yearlong, cross-disciplinary research effort at McKinsey & Company provides some answers.Read more → (more than an hour read)
The World Economic Forum
The 15th edition of the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report comes as long-mounting, interconnected risks are being felt. The global economy is faced with a “synchronized slowdown”, the past five years have been the warmest on record, and cyberattacks are expected to increase this yearRead more → (more than an hour read)
Jim Leape, Mark Abbott and Hide Sakaguchi
This paper examines existing and breakthrough technologies, such as drones, AI, and blockchains, and the associated challenges and possibilities they pose for ocean management and improving understanding of ecosystems and human interactions with the ocean.
It also explores potential markets that could stimulate demand for ocean data and ways public and private players can drive the deployment of these new models.
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International Renewable Energy Agency Energy Solutions
Increased use of renewable energy, combined with intensified electrification, could prove decisive for the world to meet key climate goals by 2050.
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High Level Panel for a Sustainable Economy
Climate change is altering ocean climate, chemistry, circulation, sea level and ice distribution. Collectively, these system changes have critical impacts on the habitats, biological productivities and species assemblages that underpin many of the economic benefits of the sea.Read more → (more than an hour read)
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg Energy Solutions Fisheries & Aquaculture Plastics & Pollution Shipping & Ports Tourism
The HLP report offers the first comprehensive, integrated assessment of the mitigation potential of a suite of ocean-based activities: renewable energy, transport, food production, and ecosystems, and the potential future contribution from carbon storage if current concerns can be resolved.
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IUCN, Global Marine and Polar Programme
Since 2000 significant and dedicated effort has been directed at raising awareness and understanding of the consequences of greenhouse gas emissions on the ocean. Carbon dioxide emitted by human activities is driving the ocean towards more acidic conditions.Read more → (more than an hour read)
UN Environmental Program Plastics & Pollution
Addressing marine plastic pollution is an urgent action, considering the rising levels of plastics in the environment and the impacts to coastal and marine ecosystems.
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Christopher Costello, Ling Cao and Stefan Gelcich, High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy Fisheries & Aquaculture
This paper considers the status and future trends of food production through fisheries and aquaculture at regional and global scales; the opportunities of ocean-based food in achieving SDG 2 (Zero Hunger); and recommendations for how current barriers might be overcome to transition to more sustainable and abundant food production from the ocean.
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Gove, J.M., et al., PNAS Plastics & Pollution
Many of the world’s marine fish spend the first days to weeks feeding and developing at the ocean surface. However, very little is known about the ocean processes that govern larval fish survivorship and hence adult fish populations that supply essential nutrients and protein to human societies.
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Alexander C. Kaufman Fisheries & Aquaculture
When winter fell on this quiet, wooded island, instinct took over. Birds flew south. Trees shed leaves. Dain Bichrest set his alarm for 3 a.m. Reaching a calloused hand through the frigid darkness, he silenced the device, stretched and started a routine that finished with the sea captain boarding his 42-foot boat and voyaging two hours into the Gulf of Maine to fishing grounds teeming with Northern shrimp. It became so routine he’d start to wake automatically.
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An interview with Laurel Bryant, Chief of External Affairs for NOAA Fisheries.
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Robert Masse Energy Solutions
Lithium-ion batteries are at the center of two other technological revolutions with the power to transform society: the transition from internal combustion engines to electric vehicles, and the shift from an electric grid powered by fossil fuels to renewable energy generators that store surplus electricity in batteries for future use. But how do they work?Read more → (17 minute read)
Theuerkauf S.J. et al., PLoS ONE Fisheries & Aquaculture
Aquaculture of bivalve shellfish and seaweed represents a global opportunity to simultaneously advance coastal ecosystem recovery and provide substantive benefits to humanity.
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IPCC
Limiting global warming to 1.5°C would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society, the IPCC said in a new assessment. With clear benefits to people and natural ecosystems, limiting global warming to 1.5°C compared to 2°C could go hand in hand with ensuring a more sustainable and equitable society, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said on Monday.Read more → (13 minute read)
Lili Jia, Steve Evans & Sander van der Linden, Nature Communcations Plastics & Pollution
Designing effective policy interventions to motivate mitigation actions requires more realistic assumptions about human decision-making based on empirical evidence from the behavioural sciences. We therefore need to consider behavioural rather than only economic costs and benefits in policy intervention designs.
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Jouffray, JP., et al., Science Advances Fisheries & Aquaculture
Can finance contribute to seafood sustainability? This is an increasingly relevant question given the projected growth of seafood markets and the magnitude of social and environmental challenges associated with seafood production. As more capital enters the seafood industry, it becomes crucial that investments steer the sector toward improved sustainability, as opposed to fueling unsustainable working conditions and overexploitation of resources.
Read more → (more than 30 minute read)
