Whether or not carbon dioxide emissions cause global warming, they're very much a pollutant -- something that's been overshadowed by the climate change battle.
In an article published in Geophysical Research Letters, climate expert Ken Caldeira and colleagues argue that CO2 emissions will soon oversaturate the oceans; within four decades, they write, oceans could become dangerously acidic, literally corroding the plankton foundations of oceanic food chains.
Along the way, ocean water will no longer meet clean water standards established by the Environmental Protection Agency. Unfortunately, these aren't binding, and the EPA has resisted categorizing CO2 as a pollutant: warming, they've argued, isn't necessarily pollution.
If, however, other scientists back Caldeira's postulations, it'll be hard for the EPA to maintain its position. Granted, catastrophic predictions are not rare to science, and very few have come true; but this is really scary stuff. It'll be a lot easier to adapt to a warming planet than to dead oceans (unless, of course, we get both. Shudder.)
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