The word "acidification" is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it to describe the process of acidifying a solution or environment. For example: "The acidification of the lake had a negative impact on the aquatic life."
The key threats are impacts from climate change including changes in temperature, sea ice, acidification, as well as the potential for increasing commercial fishing as fisheries in other parts of the world become over-exploited.
As I explained last year, scientific research on the reef suggests that it is already in danger from human-caused climate change and ocean acidification.
I've had the unfortunate pleasure of seeing the results of an experiment that mirrors the kind of temperatures and ocean acidification that Great Barrier Reef habitats can expect if fossil fuel burning continues unabated.
The QRC ads make no mention of the impact of burning coal and gas on greenhouse gas emissions, on climate change and on the vulnerability of coral reefs to rising temperatures and ocean acidification.
Ocean acidification and warming ocean temperatures, linked to increasing greenhouse gas emissions from burning all that coal and gas, are not friends of the reef.
Sardet's book, called Plankton, merges science with art and illustrates what he calls "the irreplaceable beauty and diversity of planktonic life forms", but it comes with a warning that the world's oceans are being changed by climate change and acidification.
"Premier Palaszczuk's plans will pave the way for construction of up to nine new coalmines, accelerating climate change and ocean acidification – processes that will turn the Great Barrier Reef into a coral graveyard," she said.
That has reduced average surface pH to 8.1 a fall that may sound trivial but, because the pH scale is logarithmic, equates to a 25% increase in acidity.The long-term consequences of this acidification are unknown.
In Indonesia, for instance, 95% of the coral reefs have ecologically collapsed.With the help of Indonesian community-based groups we are using low-voltage electricity to develop solid limestone reefs that reverse acidification in the surrounding sea.
But reduced carbon emissions would also stem ocean acidification which, for all its effects on pretty coral reefs, is both abstract and imperceptible to most people.
It is also linked to development because some of the most vulnerable countries are very poor, for example Sahelian states threatened by desertification and small island states affected by rising sea levels and ocean acidification.
