Acidity in ocean killed NW oysters, new study says

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2017961101_oceanacidification12m.html


. . . It's been eight years since baby oysters started dying by the billions at an Oregon hatchery and in Washington's Willapa Bay.

In 2009, top scientists drew global attention when they said evidence suggested the culprit might be changing ocean chemistry from the same greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. They just couldn't prove it — until now.

Researchers said Wednesday they can definitively show that ocean acidification is at least partly responsible for massive oyster die-offs at the hatchery in Netarts Bay, Ore.

It's the first concrete finding in North America that carbon dioxide being taken up by the oceans already is helping kill marine species.