world oceans day

Today is World Oceans Day. Our oceans cover 70% of the Earth’s surface and hold most of our water, but they are threatened on many fronts and need our help. Climate change is slowing but surely killing coral reefs.

“The magnificent Great Barrier Reef is already experiencing severe bleaching due to a 0.4°C rise in water temperature. Each year, about 60% of our reef is subject to some bleaching. Professor Ross Garnaut pointed out that we are ‘likely to see, by mid-century, the effective destruction of the Great Barrier Reef'” – Australian Conservation Foundation

swimming with dolphin

At the beach today a bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus) came into shore to wow us beach goers at Peasholm Street Dog Beach. I take photos of every little thing I see, but I didn’t bring my camera today because I planned to swim. I’m not a strong swimmer even though I go to the beach a lot. I only go in the water if the waves aren’t too big, today was such a day. Everyone else had their phone out, recording the antics of Dolph, all I could do was feast my eyes but what a sight it was!

clean up australia

Andy Warhol once said he was in love with plastic. So durable, so full of potential, everything just sliding off the surface. I could definitely see the appeal.

from Notes from the Teenage Underground by Simmone Howell (Pan Macmillan, 2006)

This Sunday is Clean Up Australia Day. Many local councils and community groups are organizing rubbish pick-ups at beaches, bushland reserves and public open spaces. You can find out where to go in your area from the ‎ Clean Up Australia Day Facebook. Go to a local spot on Sunday morning and help out. It’s going to be very hot in Perth this weekend, so take water to drink, wear a hat and sunscreen and enclosed footwear because snakes are active.

sand between my toes

summer in Perth is very hot and evenings at the beach are a delight

Desalination in Kwinana

The premier of Western Australia, Alan Carpenter, officially opened the Perth Seawater Desalination Plant last week on 18 April, in Kwinana, 25km south of Perth. Premier Carpenter said,

Western Australia has become the first state in Australia to use desalination as a major public water source. By harnessing water from the ocean, we have acquired an abundant source of drinking water that is not dependent on rainfall.

The 45 gigalitre per year desalination plant includes seawater intake, pretreatment, reverse osmosis desalination, drinking water potabilisation and pumping station and produces 17 percent of Perth’s water needs. In a news story from last year, the Western Australian Water Corporation said

its desalination plant in Kwinana will help avoid the need for total sprinkler bans in Perth and the south-west.

Desalination is a wasteful use of resources. Despite this, the WA government is hoping to open more desalination plants. WA could avoid total sprinkler bans by using water more efficiently and recycling the water we do use, as I’ve discussed previously.

The Greens (WA) Water Resources Policy 2005 discussed the desalination plant at Kwinana.

The Greens (WA) oppose the construction Kwinana by the Water Corporation of a desalination plant at Kwinana on Greenhouse gas emission grounds.

The plant does use electricity produced by the Emu Downs Wind Farm, 200km north of Perth, but this electricity could be better used in replacing electricity generated from coal, where most of Perth’s electricity currently comes from.

Some of the history of the politics of building the desalination plant can be found at the Perth Water Users Group and one of the group’s founders Warwick Hughes’ website on Perth and Catchments Rainfall History and Water Resources.

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Going to the Beach

I recently heard that

over 1500 new species have been found in Australian waters in the past 10 years.

Everywhere in the world there are countless species we haven’t yet discovered, and if we’re not careful they will be extinct before we know they’re here. The Jan/Feb 2007 issue of New Internationalist was about the State of the World’s Ocean. They note there’s really only one ocean despite our multiple names because they are all interconnected. This means what we do in one part of the ocean may affect every other part.

In Waterworld Sara Holden says,

“on land, 10 percent of our woods, meadows, forests, waterways and even swamps are protected…for the remaining 70 per cent of the planet, which is covered by the ocean, it is a very different story. Only 0.1 percent is afforded any protection” [1]

We need so many more marine reserves so our ocean isn’t over-fished, polluted, mined and exploited to the extent that there is nothing left. Sara Holden works for Greenpeace and she writes about the Greenpeace Defending our Oceans expedition.

One marine reserve is Marmion Marine Park near where I live in Perth, Western Australia. I love living near the beach and although I’m not a strong swimmer I love going to the beach and dipping my toes in or just floating in the water (if the waves are too big I don’t go in past my toes).

My dog Sheeba shares my love of the beach and we go to a dog beach south of my house. Recently we re-discovered a dog beach north of where I live which has a reef and limestone rocks. The water is gentler which is good because Sheeba and I don’t like big waves. It has a lot more seaweed and ocean life, very different to the surf beach I spend more time at. Going to this beach brought back memories of building sandcastles and snorkelling on the reef in my childhood.

“The offshore limestone reefs of Marmion Marine Park support abundant plant life. Kelps grow on the upper reef surface. Colourful sponges, gorgonian corals and other animals encrust the cave walls, crevices and overhangs.”

I grew up with limestone rock formations and caves. They are so different to the granite rock formations and caves of the coast around Albany, in the south of Western Australia, which we visited recently. Exploring limestone rocks can be painful on bare feet, so I have to remember to take shoes if I’m planning this. Limestone rock formations have a habit of caving in, so there are signs and fences around some of the rocks (the fences are waist high wire, so don’t detract too much from the scenery). When I was a kid we could explore much more (and I guess it may have been kind of dangerous and we probably trashed quite a few plants).

I remember sitting in hollows in the rocks (not quite caves but we pretended) and guarding our pirate treasure. The signs and fences still let me investigate the rock pools and even when I tell Sheeba she might do better staying on the sand, she wants to join me.

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Reference

1. Holden, Sarah (2007) “Waterworld” New Internationalist, no.397, p.25-27

Autumn in Albany

The granite rock formations and caves on the coast around Albany, in the south of Western Australia are amazing to see. Michael grew up in Albany and we went there for the weekend a couple of weeks ago. This was the first time I’ve been to Albany since childhood holidays and although I’ve seen photos of the coast since then, it’s quite a change from the limestone rock formations and caves with which I grew up. And the coast around Albany can be dangerous.

This coastline is unprotected from the Southern Ocean. Michael has a few stories of people he knew who died on the rocks and surrounding water and a week before we visited two men were washed off rocks by a king wave. King waves are unexpected and can cover entire parts of the rocks on the coast for a few minutes and wash away whatever’s in their path. The rocks can be slippery because of these waves and the salt residue they leave behind and climbing on the rocks or fishing off them can be treacherous. If a person falls into the water, it’s impossible to climb back up the rocks, you might get thrown back against them by waves and you must swim around the rocks to a sandy beach which can also be inaccessible (and you might have to contend with ocean predators on the way).

Growing up a teenage boy, Michael also has stories of the stupid things he’s done while drunk and sky-larking with his friends on these treacherous rocks.
On the day we visited The Gap and the Natural Bridge, in Torndirrup National Park, Michael and I climbed quite close to the dangerous edges and I discovered how breath-taking it is. It’s exhilarating to look down into the blue, blue ocean and think, “I’m glad I’m not being battered by those waves.” I was also glad the breeze was light and the weather fine, although king waves can occur in any weather and at any time of the year. Michael has abseiled on one rock face of the Gap when he was in high school. I wonder if they still let teenagers do that these days, in our litigation-crazy times.

I bored Michael by taking lots of photos of the plants that cling to life on these wind and wave swept rocks, but I’ll have to come back in spring when they flower to see their full glory. We were even lucky enough to catch some animal life because we came (earlyish) on Sunday morning, before the tourist rush. I was also happy to miss the current crop of teenage locals who the night before left their burnouts and empty beer bottles on the rocks and in the carpark.

While we were in the area we also went to Denmark (half an hour from Albany), visited my friend Josephine and her baby Isabel, and skated Denmark’s new sk8park. It rips, although there’s not much shade when the sun’s shining, not that the sun shines much in Denmark :)

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