Freshwater lakes, rivers and their aquatic communities are becoming increasingly vulnerable due to water abstractions and the impact of climate change.

That is according to Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) who issued a call this week to encourage future development planning applications to consider the impact of water abstractions from Ireland’s rivers, lakes and fish species.

Water level fluctuations caused by numerous pressures, including abstractions, can negatively impact aquatic ecosystems and consequently, the services they provide to the local economy and to aquatic biodiversity.

Higher water temperatures as a result of climate change are also said to have an impact on the natural water cycles of our rivers and lakes, causing thermal regimes in lakes and rivers to change. This results in a reduction in wetted area and a decrease in suitable habitat for fish and other aquatic communities during droughts.

IFI is cautioning that changes in the flow or abstraction of water in a catchment can be extremely harmful to migratory fish species such as salmon, sea trout and eel, which are already stressed as a result of climate change.

Such adverse conditions can reduce the success of fish migration and demonstrate how vulnerable these species are to changing climatic conditions and other pressures.

Francis O’Donnell, chief executive of IFI said: “It is imperative that we ensure where possible, all water resources are managed sustainably to protect our natural resources. This involves making sure that river flows and lake levels can sustain aquatic environments and biota while also allowing the use of water for drinking water supply and other purposes such as agricultural, commercial, industrial and recreational use.

“IFI strongly advises that the impacts of climate change should be considered in all planning applications for developments that affect the natural hydrological water cycle and the wider aquatic community. IFI has a statutory responsibility to protect salmonids and other freshwater fish species including eels and this will remain our first priority.”

Dr Cathal Gallagher, head of research at IFI added: “IFI’s Climate Change Mitigation Research Programme was set up in 2019 to assess the impact of climate change on Ireland’s fish and habitats. The ongoing research is already identifying areas in catchments where fish species and habitats are most under threat, but also areas that are showing resilience to climate change. It is important that we work together to safeguard the future of our natural resources.”

For more information visit IFI’s Climate Change Mitigation Research programme HERE.

This Thursday 2 March, Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) in Waterford is hosting a workshop with a twist — to play a serious game called DiadESland, about managing diadromous fish species.

DiadESland is an interactive role-playing engagement tool developed through the Interreg DiadES project. It gives stakeholders and managers an opportunity to discuss the impact of climate change on migratory fish, rivers and catchments through an imaginary environment.

Participants will team up and play the role of catchment managers, making management decisions to achieve a set of goals for their catchment.

It is an excellent opportunity for networking in an informal setting but with an important objective: to discuss the serious issues facing diadromous fish species in the context of climate change.

This session will also allow IFI to discuss future strategies and management recommendations.

EU Interreg AA funding allows for providing players with a fully catered workshop, and travel costs will be refunded (as required).

There is no requirement for expertise in fish or fish management to play the game and all sectors involved with fish management or commercialisation are warmly invited.

Register your interest on the IFI website HERE.

In a letter sent to Irish ministers and other elected officials last week, three NGOs call on the Government to amend mandates and legislation to ensure public bodies are fit to deliver on Ireland’s climate, biodiversity and water objectives.

The Environmental Pillar, the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition and the Sustainable Water Network (SWAN) claim that “a lack of government oversight and accountability in the operation of public bodies is undermining Ireland’s response to the declared climate and biodiversity emergency”.

They also demand that “narrow economic mandates” conferred on public bodies like Coillte and Bord na Móna “must be immediately amended and brought in line with environmental and climate obligations at national and EU level”.

The groups call for public land “to be utilised in the public interest” and that all public bodies “be mandated to take the lead in Ireland’s response to climate change and biodiversity loss”.

“Public land must be utilised in the public interest and the Irish people should have a greater say in how that is achieved,” said Fintan Kelly of the Environmental Pillar.

“At a time when we are asking private landowners to do more in response to climate change and biodiversity loss, it is critical that the State is seen to lead from the front.

“The untapped potential of Coillte and Bord na Móna’s land holdings presents an unprecedented opportunity to restore nature at scale, delivering essential ecosystem services to society such as biodiversity restoration, climate change mitigation and adaptation, as well as employment and public amenity. This is an opportunity we can’t afford to ignore any longer.”

SWAN board member Dr Elaine McGoff added: “The actions of Coillte, Bord na Móna and the OPW, along with many other public bodies, have a substantial impact on the health and biodiversity of our rivers, lakes, wetlands, and seas.

“Forestry is the third most significant pressure on our waterbodies and is a key contributor to the loss of our most pristine rivers, down from five hundred to just twenty in the last few decades.

“Considerable damage to our water environment is also being caused by drainage and infilling of our bogs and wetlands by Bord na Móna and others, along with arterial drainage works on our rivers by the OPW.

“Wetland protection and restoration are recognised as key to solving our water, biodiversity and climate crises. If we are serious about improving water quality, the protection and restoration of our natural systems must be made core obligations for these public bodies by amending their legal mandates.”

The forthcoming edition of The Ocean Race, which sets sail from Alicante on 15 January, is set to feature the most ambitious and comprehensive science programme created by a sporting event.

Every boat participating in the gruelling six-month around-the-world race will carry specialist equipment onboard to measure a range of variables throughout the 60,000km route, which will be analysed by scientists from eight leading research organisations to further understanding about the state of the ocean.

Sailing through some of the most remote parts of the planet, seldom reached by scientific vessels, teams will have a unique opportunity to collect vital data where information is lacking on two of the biggest threats to the health of the seas: the impact of climate change and plastic pollution.

Launched during the 2017-18 edition of the race in collaboration with 11th Hour Racing — premier partner of The Ocean Race and founding partner of the Racing with Purpose sustainability programme — the innovative science programme will capture even more types of data in the forthcoming race, including for the first time levels of oxygen and trace elements in the water.

Data will also be delivered to science partners faster in this edition, transmitted via satellite and reaching the organisations, which includes World Meteorological Organisation, National Oceanography Centre, Max Planck Society, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in real time.

Stefan Raimund, science lead at The Ocean Race, said: “A healthy ocean isn’t just vital to the sport we love, it regulates the climate, provides food for billions of people and supplies half the planet’s oxygen. Its decline impacts the entire world. To halt it, we need to supply governments and organisations with scientific evidence and demand they act on it.

“We are in a unique position to contribute to this; data collected during our previous races has been included in crucial reports about the state of the planet that have informed and influenced decisions by governments. Knowing that we can make a difference in this way has inspired us to expand our science programme even further and collaborate with more of the world’s leading science organisations to support their vital research.”

The journey of the data captured in The Ocean Race science programme

In total, 15 types of environmental data will be collected during The Ocean Race 2022-23, including:

• Indicators of climate change: Two boats, 11th Hour Racing Team and Team Malizia, will carry OceanPacks, which take water samples to measure levels of carbon dioxide, oxygen, salinity and temperature, providing insights about the impact of climate change on the ocean. Trace elements, including iron, zinc, copper and manganese, will also be captured for the first time. These elements are vital for the growth of plankton, an essential organism as it is the first part of the food chain and the ocean’s biggest producers of oxygen.
• Plastic pollution: GUYOT environnement – Team Europe and Holcim – PRB will take regular water samples throughout the race to test for microplastics. As with the previous edition of the Race, the amount of microplastics will be measured throughout the route and, for the first time, samples will also be analysed to determine which plastic product the fragments originated from (for example, a bottle or carrier bag).
• Meteorological data: The entire fleet will use onboard weather sensors to measure wind speed, wind direction and air temperature. Some teams will also deploy drifter buoys in the Southern Ocean to capture these measurements on an ongoing basis, along with location data, which helps to grow understanding about how currents and the climate are changing. Meteorological data will help to improve weather forecasts and are particularly valuable for predicting extreme weather events, as well as revealing insights on longer-term climate trends.
• Ocean Biodiversity: Biotherm is collaborating with the Tara Ocean Foundation to trial an experimental research project to study ocean biodiversity during the Race. An onboard automated microscope will record images of marine phytoplankton on the ocean surface, which will be analysed to provide insights on phytoplankton diversity in the ocean, along with biodiversity, food webs and the carbon cycle.

All of the collected data is open-source and shared with The Ocean Race’s science partners: organisations across the world that are examining the impact of human activity on the ocean. It will feed into reports including those from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and databases such as the Surface Ocean Carbon Dioxide Atlas, which provides data for the Global Carbon Budget, a yearly assessment of carbon dioxide that informs targets and predictions for carbon reduction.

Véronique Garçon, senior scientist at CNRS said: “The Ocean Race’s science programme is vital for the science community and their work to support the UN Decade of Ocean Science. The data gathered by the boats from remote parts of the world, where information is scarce, is particularly valuable.

“Put simply, the more data we have, the more accurately we can understand the ocean’s capacity to cope with climate change and predict what will happen to the climate in future.”

The Ocean Race’s science programme, which is supported by 11th Hour Racing, Time to Act partner Ulysse Nardin and Official Plastic-Free Ocean partner Archwey, is being ramped up at a time when the impact of human activity on the ocean is becoming more widely understood.

Recent studies have highlighted how higher temperatures in the ocean are fuelling extreme weather events and sea levels are projected to rise at a faster rate than anticipated, while whales have been found to ingest millions of microplastics every day.

Earlier today (Monday 14 November), Patrick O’Donovan, Minister of State with responsibility for the Office of Public Works at the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform visited the Marine Institute’s headquarters in Oranmore, Co Galway.

The minister met with the Marine Institute’s chief executive Dr Paul Connolly as well as Michael Gillooly, director of oceans, climate and information services (OCIS); Dr Glenn Nolan, manager of ocean climate services; Alan Berry, manager of offshore renewable energy and infrastructure services; and Dr Tomasz Dabrowski, team leader in ocean climate services.

Several Office of Public Works (OPW) officials were also part of the visit today, including Robert Mooney (head of planning and climate adaptation), Mark Adamson and Vincent Hussey (flood risk assessment and management).

Minister O’Donovan visited to gain an understanding of the role of the Marine Institute in climate adaptation and particularly how data is collected and used in climate modelling and monitoring, to deal with the impacts of climate change on our coastline.

As part of the visit, the Institute team gave an overview of how the climate modelling and monitoring that it manages is integrated with other parts of the national and international approach to informing the overall climate strategy.

Dr Connolly said: “We are delighted to welcome Minister O’Donovan and colleagues from the Office of Public Works to the Marine Institute to see our facilities and exchange ideas with colleagues from the OPW which contribute to addressing impacts of climate change on our coastline.”

Gillooly added: “Forecasting ocean and climate change is one of the institute’s strategic focus areas. The Marine Institute has a range of observational infrastructures around the Irish marine area continually gathering data on the marine environment.

“Over the years, we have built up significant time-series information and this data is central to developing digital services including operational modelling which inform climate mitigation and adaptation measures in areas such as sea level rise and flooding.”

The Marine Institute’s Oceans, Climate and Information Services Group provides support for national and international marine monitoring, marine mapping, research and development as well as information technology infrastructure and digital service development.

Researchers from Trinity College Dublin are among a team of marine scientists that have used tiger sharks to discover the world’s largest seagrass ecosystem.

According to The Irish Times, the team attached cameras to the sharks who inhabit the enormous network of seagrass meadows in the Bahamas and help maintain its health by controlling numbers of grazing marine wildlife like turtles and manatees.

The video footage provided a never-before-seen look into an ecosystem that’s crucially important for carbon sequestration, among other things, while also helping the scientists to map the area which amounts to as much as 92,000 square kilometres.

The Bahamas have been known for an abundance of seagrass meadows but the full extent was not determined until now | Credit: Beneath the Waves

“This is an exciting and important discovery for a range of reasons,” said Nicholas Payne, assistant professor in Trinity’s School of Natural Sciences and co-author of the research published in the journal Nature Communications.

“Here in Ireland, we have a huge coastal area that likely supports significant seagrass ecosystems,” he added.

The Irish Times has more on the story HERE.

On a special climate-focused edition of RTÉ’s Prime Time this past week, the news programme put the plight of Ireland’s wild salmon stocks in the spotlight.

Reporter Oonagh Smyth visited the Dawros River in Connemara where salmon runs have allegedly shrunk from as many as 3,000 two decades ago to less than 900 today.

These figures lead to an even worse picture nation-wide, with data showing that only 150,000 wild salmon returned to their spawning grounds in 2019 — a decline of almost 80% on the more than 685,000 salmon recorded in 2000.

Various reasons are behind this alarming fall, with climate change chief among them — forcing salmon to migrate further to find colder waters, and interrupting the food webs that sustain the fish at sea and in our rivers.

But local factors have also been blamed, including the licensing of open-cage salmon aquaculture against which conservation groups and some arms of the State are united in their opposition due to the risks of sea lice infestations.

RTÉ News has much more on the story HERE.

The European Sea Ports Organisation (ESPO) presented this week its ESPO Annual ESPO Environmental Report 2022 - EcoPortInsights.

The ESPO Environmental Report is part of EcoPorts, the environmental flagship initiative of ESPO and this 7th edition of the report is based on data from 92 European ports from 20 European countries, who filled in the EcoPorts Self-Diagnosis Method (SDM) To visit: www.ecoports.com.

The SDM is a free checklist of good practices that provides the database for the report.

The ESPO Environmental Report 2022 contains a number of positive trends amongst key indicators. For the first time since the start of monitoring, climate change has become the top environmental priority of ports. This underscores the value of the Environmental Report reporting on environmental performance of the sector. It provides ESPO and European policymakers with insights on the environmental issues that European ports are facing.

The other Top 10 priorities remain almost the same as for the past years, with air quality and energy efficiency joining climate change in the top three of port priorities.
In 2022, the report finds that ports continue to improve their environmental management, addressing their top priorities to a greater degree than in the past.

A growing share of ports are also getting certified with PERS, the only port-specific environmental standard on the market developed by ports, for ports.

Some key indicators such as environmental training programmes for port employees and monitoring of air quality saw slight downturns compared to last year, and will be followed up by ESPO ahead of next year’s report.

The ESPO Environmental Report strengthens the long-standing efforts of European ports to monitor and address high priority environmental issues, whilst communicating port efforts to key stakeholders.

“Since 2020, the world is going through never before seen crises and Europe’s ports are facing challenges they never had to face before. These challenges come on top of long-term efforts to move towards a more sustainable future in the maritime sector, with ports seeking to do their part in the decarbonisation of Europe. It is reassuring to see that the challenging period we are going through is not holding back ports to continue to engage towards their environmental goals and strategy. I hope this report is also a stimulus for ports to continue on this path,” says Isabelle Ryckbost, ESPO Secretary General.

“As the EcoPorts Network celebrates its 25-year anniversary, the 2022 Annual ESPO Environmental Report shows that European ports continue the good work with environmental monitoring and management. The 2022 Report highlights strengths to build on, and issues to address in the years to come. The work continues to make sure that the EcoPorts Network provides ports with essential tools to further engage in greening from the bottom up,” says Valter Selén, EcoPorts Coordinator.

New binding targets for greenhouse gas reductions in shipping are among a range of measures agreed today (Friday 3 June) by EU transport ministers today to reduce emissions in the transport sector in the coming decade.

The new measures, which are to apply to all EU member states, have been negotiated over the last 12 months and agreed under the EU’s “Fit for 55” package: the flagship suite of legislation announced last July to ensure the bloc meets its 2030 climate targets. The EU is aiming for a minimum 55% reduction in GHG emissions compared to 1990 levels.

With this agreement, the stage is set for negotiations with the European Parliament on the final text of these important pieces of legislation.

Welcoming the agreement reached, Ireland’s Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan stressed the importance of the progress made: “This agreement is the result of almost a year of intensive discussions. It is imperative that the EU puts ambitious targets in place if we are to meet our collective goals for the climate.

“Action is urgently needed, not only for road transport but also to realise genuine emission reductions in aviation and shipping. Today’s agreement shows that the EU can be the global leader on climate change.”

Minister Ryan said that while Ireland had pushed for even greater ambition in certain aspects of the maritime and aviation fuel files, the council-agreed texts represent a strong step forward in transitioning towards more sustainable fuels in both sectors.

East Cork, Waterford, Galway and the Shannon Estuary will be the first to bear the brunt of an “alarming and startling” rise in sea levels, a TD has warned.

As the Irish Examiner reports, David Stanton (Cork East) expressed his fears of a “truly frightening” outcome for many coastal communities in the continued absence of a national coastal risk strategy.

“There is no point waiting until the seawater is up to our knees and then saying we should have planned for this 20 years ago,” he said.

The Irish Examiner has more on the story HERE.