pacific coast

A starfish to the rescue

June 3, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Beginning in 2013, a mysterious disease associated with a marine heatwave decimated the population of sunflower sea stars. Those huge, colorful 24-armed starfish thrived along the Pacific Coast between Alaska and Baja California. But in fairly short order, nearly six billion of the creatures perished, amounting to 94% of the global population. California lost 99% of its sea stars to the wasting disease.

The result was an ecological disaster. Sunflower sea stars are carnivorous and purple urchins are the mainstay of their diet. Without sea stars to balance the food web, the urchin population exploded. Urchins devour kelp and over the past decade, 96% of the region’s kelp forests vanished. Kelp forests serve as shelter and food for a vast array of marine life and kelp sequesters carbon as much as 20 times more than terrestrial forests.

Researchers in California and Alaska are breeding sunflower sea stars in captivity to try to produce enough of the creatures to support reintroduction. The first successful spawning of sea stars took place last year at the Birch Aquarium at San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. But all of these are siblings, which is not a desirable breeding stock for a new population. So, they are now working with the Alaska SeaLife Center, which has the largest collection of the animals in the world. The center will provide animals to introduce genetic diversity to the growing population in captivity.

The hope is to be able to reintroduce sea stars to the Pacific region within three to five years.

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A rare, giant starfish could hold the key to restoring kelp forests on the California coast

Photo, posted November 11, 2007, courtesy of Patrick Briggs via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Help For Kelp | Earth Wise

April 10, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The warming of the oceans has been causing the decimation of kelp forests. The thick canopies covering coastal ocean regions have been wilting in warmer and nutrient-poor water. Making matters much worse has been the explosion in population of sea urchins that thrive in warmer water. The urchins gobble up the kelp, often resulting in so-called urchin barrens, largely devoid of life.

Kelp are considered a foundation species that occupy nearly half of the world’s marine ecoregions. They thrive in cold water, where they form large underwater forests that provide essential habitat, food, and refuge for many species. Kelp are often harvested for use in products ranging from toothpaste and shampoo to puddings and cakes. Including the other services kelp provide, they are associated with billions of dollars in value annually.

On the North American Pacific Coast, a species of sea star consumes sea urchins. However, these creatures are critically endangered. A marine wildlife epidemic known as sea star wasting syndrome, which began 10 years ago, has killed off more than 90% of the sunflower sea star population. A new study by researchers at Oregon State University looked at the ability of sea stars to control sea urchin populations.

Lab experiments showed that sea stars consume urchins at a rate sufficient to maintain and possibly even restore the health of kelp forests. The study shows that there is a clear link between the population crash of sea stars, the explosion in sea urchin populations, and the decline in kelp.

The study’s authors are calling for active management and a coordinated sea star recovery program to try to deal with the effects of a disease whose cause has not been determined.

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Sea stars able to consume kelp-eating urchins fast enough to protect kelp forests, research shows

Photo, posted December 14, 2015, courtesy of Ed Dunens via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

California Offshore Wind Auction | Earth Wise

January 10, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

In December, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management held the first auction for offshore wind energy leases on the West Coast. The BOEM lease sale offered five lease areas covering 373,268 acres off the central and northern California coast. The leased areas have the potential to produce over 4.6 gigawatts of wind energy, which is enough to power 1.5 million homes.

The auction drew competitive bids from five companies totaling over $750 million. The winning bidders were RWE Offshore Wind Holdings, California North Floating, Equinor Wind, Central California Offshore Wind, and Invenergy California Offshore.

RWE is a German company with subsidiaries across the globe. California North Floating is an affiliate of the Danish developer Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners. Equinor Wind is a Norwegian company already heavily involved in offshore wind projects on the East Coast. Central California Offshore Wind is managed by a joint venture between Spanish and French energy companies. Invenergy is a privately held global developer and operator of renewable energy headquartered in Chicago.

The bidders will receive credits for participating in programs that support work force training programs for the floating offshore wind industry and/or the development of a US domestic supply chain for that industry.

Offshore wind off the Pacific coast has enormous potential for enhancing the country’s energy future but represents a significant challenge because the deep ocean floors necessitate the use of floating wind technology as opposed to turbines that are affixed to the sea floor.

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Biden-Harris Administration Announces Winners of California Offshore Wind Energy Auction

Photo, posted December 30, 2013, courtesy of Derek Finch via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

California Offshore Wind | Earth Wise

November 16, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

California has tremendous potential offshore wind resources. The state set a preliminary target of 15 GW of offshore wind by 2045 earlier this year and may increase that number to 25 GW. But installing offshore wind on the West Coast is much more challenging than it is on the East Coast. The reason is that the ocean floor drops off rapidly on the Pacific Coast and it is simply not practical to attach wind turbines to the sea bottom. Instead, floating turbine technology will be required. That is more complicated and more expensive.

Despite the challenges, offshore wind in California is moving forward. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management announced that the auction for rights to develop waters off central and northern California will be held on December 6. This will be the first wind auction ever along the U.S. Pacific Coast.

The auction will include three lease areas in the Morro Bay Wind Energy Area and two proposed areas in the Humboldt Wind Energy Area. Combined, the two areas cover over 370,000 acres and could potentially host over 4.5 GW of wind generating capacity. The projects developed in these areas are likely to become the first floating offshore wind projects in operation in the U.S.

Apart from the challenges of building floating wind installations, there will be the issue of the electric grid in the proposed regions being able to support the added generation from the wind farms. Substantial grid upgrades will be needed to accommodate all the power coming from the offshore facilities. In addition, California offshore wind projects will need to jump-start new supply chains in the U.S.

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Date is set for California offshore wind lease auction

Photo, posted March 24, 2016, courtesy of Andy Dingley / TEIA via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Floating Renewable Energy | Earth Wise

July 22, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

A team of researchers at Texas A&M University believes that the next generation of offshore energy could come in the form of a synergistic combination of multiple renewable energy generators installed on a floating offshore platform.

Their concept for the ocean renewable energy station comprises wind, wave, ocean current, and solar energy elements that could generate electricity for anything from a coastal or island community to a research lab or military unit. The station would be tethered to the sea bottom and could be used in locations where the water depth increases quickly, such as along the U.S. Pacific Coast or Hawaii.

Offshore wind is already commercially competitive, while wave-energy converters so far have been less cost-effective and only useful for specialized, smaller-scale applications. The proposed ocean renewable energy station would make use of multiple different methods of electricity generation and incorporate innovative smart materials in the wave energy converters that respond to changes in wave height and frequency and allow for more consistent power production.

Denmark is already building a huge multi-source, multi-purpose ocean energy island. This world’s first energy island will be 30 acres in area and serve as a hub for 200 giant offshore wind turbines generating 3 GW of electric power. It is the largest construction project in Danish history, and will cost an estimate $34 billion. As well as supplying other European countries with electricity, the goal is to use the new offshore island to produce green hydrogen from seawater, which can also be exported. Large battery banks on the island will store surplus electricity for use in times of high demand.

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Research Underway On Floating Renewable Energy Station

Photo, posted September 27, 2014, courtesy of Eric Gross via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

American Robins And Climate Change | Earth Wise

April 30, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

American robins are migratory songbirds that can be found throughout much of North America. Named after European robins because of their reddish-orange breast, American robins are often found hopping across lawns and nesting on porches. Their rich caroling is among the first pre-dawn bird songs heard in spring and summer.

While some overwinter in northern parts of the United States and southern Canada, most American robins migrate south to overwinter in places like Florida and the Gulf Coast, as well as central Mexico and the Pacific Coast. They typically head south by the end of August and return north sometime between February and March to their breeding grounds in Canada and Alaska. They spend their short time there trying to find a mate, build a nest, raise a family, and consume enough food to sustain themselves on their long return journey south.

But climate change is making these seasonal rhythms less predictable. According to a new study recently published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, American robin migration is kicking off earlier by about five days each decade. The birds now migrate 12 days earlier than they did in 1994.

For 25 years, researchers at Canada’s Slave Lake have been recording the timing of American robin spring migration. They attached GPS devices to 55 robins, tracking their movements from April through June. The researchers linked the birds’ movement with weather data, including air temperature, snow depth, wind speed, and precipitation. The results showed that robins start migrating north earlier when winters are warm and dry.

Understanding the influence over the timing of migratory events is important because the timing of migration can influence reproductive success.

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A Migration Mystery

American robins now migrate 12 days earlier than in 1994

Photo, posted January 1, 2020, courtesy of Becky Matsubara via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.