15 FOCUS ON ENVIRONMENT
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TURNING DOWN THE NOISE TO SAVE OUR OCEANS KAUST Professor Carlos Duarte is leading global efforts to understand and mitigate ocean noise pollution There is growing awareness of how environmental noise impacts human health. According to estimates by the World Health Organization, noise from cars, trucks, airplanes and trains can cause or exacerbate existing ailments such as tinnitus, sleep disturbances, obesity, diabetes and ischemic heart disease, resulting in an annual loss of 1 million healthy years of life in Western Europe alone. Some experts have warned that it could be the next big public health crisis for humans, while biologists have shown that noise can significantly impact animal populations as well – preventing birds from migrating, for example. Far less attention has been given to the impact that anthropogenic (or man-made) noise has on our oceans, where roughly 80% of the world’s merchandise is transported along routes shared with whales, fish and a wide array of other maritime species. Led by KAUST Distinguished Professor of Marine Science Carlos Duarte, a global team of scientists is working to understand how anthropogenic noise impacts marine life and what policy interventions can be implemented to mitigate its effects. Humans often assume that the ocean is silent because we do not hear well underwater due to the way our ears function, but sound travels far – and quickly – underwater. Marine animals are sensitive to sound, which they use as a prominent sensorial signal to guide many aspects of their behaviour and ecology. As such, the rise in anthropogenic noise
from cargo shipping, seismic blasting, active sonar, pile-driving and fishing vessels has been detrimental to marine wildlife. Ocean noise pollution can disrupt their behaviour, physiology, reproduction and – in extreme cases – end their lives. Whales have been found washed up with ears bleeding from decompression injuries caused by anti-submarine-warfare training. Sonar emitted by submarines and other vessels has been shown to frighten whales or cause them to panic and leave their foraging areas. Anthropogenic noise also impacts the vocalizations whales and other marine mammals use to communicate, find food and locate one another. In a multi-institutional meta-study published in Science in February 2021, Professor Duarte and researchers from a host of countries – including Denmark, the US, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Norway and Canada – document the adverse effects of humanity’s sonic footprint, and present a path toward solutions in a context of ocean health and sustainable ocean economies. Reviewing over 10,000 papers, the researchers concluded that ocean noise interferes with how marine animals hear, communicate and respond to the ecological processes they depend on for survival. Mitigating the impacts of noise from human activities on marine life is therefore key to achieving healthier oceans and deserves to be prioritised alongside factors such as pollution, climate change and overfishing.
