Ocean Science Leaders Come Together to Create First-ever Ocean Pavilion at COP27

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A group of the world’s leading ocean science and philanthropic organizations, led by Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), have come together to highlight the global ocean at the upcoming 27th Conference of the Parties (COP27) in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.  

The Ocean Pavilion in the conference’s official meeting area will highlight the crucial importance of the ocean to Earth’s climate and to efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change in the safest, most effective ways science can offer. It will also be the first time the ocean has been the singular focus of a pavilion inside the central “Blue Zone” at any COP and the first time a pavilion has been organized principally by a group of research institutions. 

“Earth is an ocean planet,” said WHOI President and Director Peter de Menocal. “The ocean gives us the oxygen we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat. It also provides jobs for billions of people, including many of the world's most vulnerable. It’s only natural that the ocean should also be at the center of discussions about the sustainability of human activity on Earth, including how it can help stabilize the global climate system at a safe level." 

“The ocean is the engine of Earth’s climate,” said Margaret Leinen, Director of Scripps Oceanography, and Vice Chancellor for Marine Sciences at UC San Diego. “We know that it has absorbed 90 percent of the heat produced by human activity since the dawn of the industrial age and it holds 20 times more carbon than the atmosphere and terrestrial plants combined. Put simply, the ocean is climate, and the climate is the ocean.” 

The Ocean Pavilion will serve as a central hub for conference delegates to exchange ideas about how to address climate change by leveraging the ocean. Throughout the conference, held from November 6 to 18, the pavilion will feature events, meetings, and in-depth discussions that elaborate on the daily conference themes and that explore issues surrounding COP27’s overarching goal of implementing the commitments made by nations in the wake of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. Visitors to the pavilion will also be able to learn more about the work of Ocean Pavilion partners and to speak with scientists engaged in the search for solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges.  

The annual COP meetings bring together world leaders and climate experts from nearly 200 countries, as well as leaders in industry, trade, transportation, finance, labor, and more to focus on the shared mission of meeting the commitments made under the Paris Agreement. Under the agreement, countries pledged to collectively cut their greenhouse gas emissions enough to keep the planet from warming by no more than 1.5–2° C (2.7–3.6° F) relative to pre-industrial times. Progress toward those goals has lagged and, as a result, the planet has already warmed by about 1°C, lending even greater urgency to the search for safe, effective solutions to reduce the upward march of global temperatures. 

In order to keep warming below the thresholds stated in the Paris Agreement, scientists are growing increasingly vocal about the need to greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and, at the same time, develop and deploy methods of removing more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than human activities produce. To succeed, this strategy, known as “net negative emissions,” will require large-scale, nature-based solutions. Because the ocean makes up more than two-thirds of Earth's surface, achieving that goal will almost certainly require leveraging the natural ocean processes that already influence the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A 2022 study by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine highlighted six promising methods, but concluded that, for any method to be successful, science must lead the way in determining the most appropriate set of solutions that help society meet its targets without adversely affecting the ocean. 

At the same time, the ocean can also help address a much broader array of challenges faced by people around the world, including food security, energy production, water management, and economic growth. For that reason, the United Nations recently established the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, and convened the 2022 United Nations Ocean Conference in Lisbon to emphasize that the world community needs to focus efforts on better understanding the ocean in order to unlock solutions worldwide.