Now, dumb ass Frank, the oceans ph has already dropped 0.1 ph.
http://asoc.org/storage/documents/Meetings/ATCM/XXXIV/Ocean_Acidification_and_the_Southern_Ocean.pdf
Summary
Ocean acidification, the term for the decline in pH of ocean water resulting from increases in atmospheric
carbon dioxide concentrations, poses severe potential threats to marine environments, including the Southern
Ocean, not least because of the rapid rate at which it is progressing compared with anything organisms have
faced in the past. This is likely to make adaptation difficult. The unique characteristics of the Southern Ocean
suggest that ocean acidification will have its greatest initial impacts there in the waters surrounding
Antarctica if greenhouse gas emissions continue to occur at present rates.
Aragonite, a form of calcium carbonate essential to shell forming organisms such as the pteropods that are
important to the Southern Ocean food chain, will be undersaturated, or present at low levels, throughout the
Southern Ocean by 2100 under the IPCC IS92a business as usual emissions scenario. The Southern Ocean
is already relatively undersaturated with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3). Even under the more
conservative IPCC S650 scenario, which assumes that atmospheric CO2 will only reach 563 ppm by 2100,
the aragonite saturation horizon1 is likely to have shrunk from its present depth of 730 to 60 m by 2100, with
the entire Weddell Sea undersaturated with respect to aragonite. Under these conditions, some organisms are
likely to have difficulty forming shells, with possibly serious impacts on the food web.
It is imperative that more research programs be undertaken to fill current knowledge gaps on Southern Ocean
acidification and its impacts as soon as possible. Long-term studies of acidification for the entire lifecycle of
important species are needed, including implications for non-calcifying organisms and impacts of ocean
acidification on other biological processes besides calcification in invertebrates and vertebrates.
