Story at a glance
- A new study maps out coastal areas impacted by light pollution.
- Researchers have studied how light pollution can affect human health and land animals but not much is known about light pollution’s effects on sea life.
- The researchers that compiled the study also found that coastal cities leave up to 75 percent of their neighboring sea floors exposed to artificial light.
Up to 1.9 million square kilometers of the earth’s coastal waters are being affected by light pollution, according to a new study.
The study was crafted by researchers from the University of Plymouth, Plymouth Marine Laboratory, University of Strathclyde, The Arctic University of Norway, Bar-Ilan University, The Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences of Eilat and Beit Berl Academic College and is part of the Artificial Light Impacts on Coastal Ecosystems (ALICE) project, according to a release.
Researchers have long suspected that artificial light affects human health and disturbs ecosystems on land, but light from cities and ships can also be harmful to sea life, according to Scientific American. There are many species of marine animals that depend on predictable light changes that happen during the day, seasons or lunar cycles, according to the release.
In addition, light from coastal cities or boats can scatter long distances out to the ocean and “differs in wavelengths penetrating the water,” researchers note.
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The study notes that 1.9 million square kilometers of coastal ocean water is exposed to artificial light at a depth of one meter, or roughly 3.1 percent of global Exclusive Economic Zones. At 10 meters deep only 1.6 million square kilometers is exposed and by 20 meters down only 840,000 square kilometers is impacted by artificial light.
A study published in “Scientific Reports” July of last year by the same team found that coastal cities leave up to “75% of their neighboring seafloor exposed to harmful light pollution,” according to the release.
In addition, research published in “Current Biology” in June of that year also showed how artificial lighting along coastlines could have “significant impact” on marine life that rely on the moon and stars to find food.
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