Oceanic Sectors- At a Glance
It is estimated that the world could easily be fed if just 2% of oceans were used for sustainable farming of seaweed. Apart from serving as a food source, seaweed has the potential to provide organic fertilizer for agriculture, a sustainable replacement for plastics, and ingredients for cosmetics and medications. Seaweed also cleans up undersea nitrates and phosphates, helping to fight ocean pollution, and can improve fish stock growth by up to 20%. There are challenges , however, such as lack of space to grow underwater forests near shorelines and difficulty with licenses for offshore farming.
The different areas within the oceanic sector play various critical roles in transporting goods, providing energy, and feeding populations. An OECD Report suggests that shallow-water offshore oil and gas production generated value in the order of around USD 468 billion, whereas deep-water offshore oil and gas production gave rise to approximately USD 35 billion in value added. Around 270 floating oil and gas platforms (Lloyds Register Marine, 2013) and more than 9,000 fixed offshore platforms are operating, mainly concentrated in the biggest offshore oil and gas-rich sedimentary basins, such as the North Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, the Arab-Persian Gulf, West Africa, East Africa, North and South America, India, the North and South China Sea and West Australia.
The industry-specific value added for the offshore wind industry was estimated at around USD 2.9 billion in 2010. Some 887 offshore wind turbines (Lloyd's Register Marine, 2013) contributed to around 340 gigawatts (GW) capacity of offshore wind.
Wave energy has the potential to meet all the electricity needs around the world, however the technologies to scale wave energy are still developing. According to the IEA, for ocean power generation to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, it needs to grow yearly by 33%. Policies promoting R&D are needed to achieve further cost reductions and large-scale development.
The shipping industry, adding about $23 billion in value and employing around 1.2 million people, encompasses various operations and management tasks such as storing, loading, unloading, port development, and construction. Based on the OECD's ITF Database, the direct value added of global port throughput was estimated at around $193 billion in 2009, with over half occurring in Asia. The sector also includes shipbuilding, repair, and maintenance, with an economic contribution of around $58 billion from the vessels completed in 2010. However, the period around 2010 saw unusually high levels of shipbuilding, leading to subsequent overcapacity.
Maritime transport, responsible for 7% of global oil consumption, heavily pollutes due to the high sulphur dioxide content in bunker oil. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) is pushing for greener practices with regulations aimed at improving ship energy efficiency. Despite contributing to 2.2% of total global emissions in 2012, options for wide-scale adoption of zero-carbon fuels and technologies are currently limited in the shipping sector. Nonetheless, the IMO has adopted a strategy to reduce the sector's total annual greenhouse gas emissions by 50% in 2050, compared to 2008 levels, including a global limit of 0.5% on sulfur in ship fuel oil effective from 2020.
This category also includes ocean-related tourism and leisure activities. Global direct value added in marine and coastal tourism was estimated at USD 390 billion. Direct employment in 2013 was around 7 million full-time jobs in maritime and coastal tourism (WTTC). Based on data on the regional distribution of value added European Cruise Council , it was estimated that in 2010, cruise tourism contributed around USD 17.8 billion in direct value added and 150,000 employees.
The last couple of decades have seen a drastic increase in the melting of sea ice in the Arctic and Antarctic which has far-reaching impacts not just on the two Earth’s poles but also on the entire world. Various innovative ways have been adopted to monitor the extent of sea ice, such as Sea Ice Aware , a web application which displays the monthly mean sea ice extent for the Arctic and Antarctic along with the historical median extent. Graphs in the app are used to visualize the minimum and maximum extent for each year.