LOHAFEX

LOHAFEX was an experiment on marine fertilization in the South Atlantic initiated by the Federal Ministry of Research and carried out by the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) in 2009 . It was also a German-Indian cooperation project. The word itself is an acronym and suitcase word at the same time , composed of the Indian word LOHA for iron and FEX for "Fertilization EXperiment". LOHAFEX should be a contribution to POGO, the Partnership for Observation of the oceans ( P artnership for O bservation of the G lobal O Ceans). In the AWI, the expedition is called ANT-XXV / 3 . To this end, weekly reports were published on the institute's website.

As part of the experiment, the German research ship Polarstern deployed 6 t of iron in the form of iron sulfate in a 300 square kilometer test area. The iron sulfate should be distributed in the top 15 meters of the water layer. It was expected that when the algae bloom then a significant part of the carbon dioxide dissolved in the water would be organically bound as carbon through assimilation and sink to the sea floor. On January 7, 2009, the ship left Cape Town . The expedition ended after 70 days on March 17th, 2009 in Punta Arenas , Chile .

The technique of fertilizing the ocean with iron sulfate is controversial; the Federal Environment Ministry temporarily called for the experiment to be stopped because environmentalists fear that artificial algae will damage marine plants and animals. Most critics fear long-term effects that cannot be captured by a few weeks of observation. Other critics fear the entry into large-scale influencing of ecosystems with large-scale geoengineering experiments .

LOHAFEX was not the first experiment of its kind. Already in 2000 and 2004, comparable amounts of iron sulfate were applied from the same ship ( EisenEx experiment), whereby 10 to 20 percent of the algae bloom from diatoms died and sank to the sea floor. This additional part removed the absorbed carbon from the atmosphere.

One of the main results of this experiment was that the growth of other small algae was stimulated by iron fertilization. These were immediately eaten by zooplankton and higher taxa and organic carbon could not sink. Accordingly, extensive fertilization of the huge sub-Antarctic zone with iron would not result in significant amounts of CO _{2 being} bound from the atmosphere, since the silica content in the surface water of this area is too low.

Web links

• Polarstern expedition AWI: Lohafex gives new insights into plankton ecology - little atmospheric carbon dioxide is bound in the southern ocean
• Answer of the federal government to the minor question of the MP Undine Kurth (Quedlinburg) ... The LOHAFEX experiment in the southern polar sea (BT-Drucksache 16/12119, March 11, 2009, PDF file) ( basic information about the process - ID: 16 -18134 )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from October 8, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
2. ↑ http://commonsblog.wordpress.com/2009/01/14/lohafex-uber-sich-selbst/
3. ↑ http://commonsblog.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/polarsternreise-zur-manipulation-der-erde/
4. ↑ "Geo-engineering in the Southern Ocean" (English; PDF; 356 kB)
5. ↑ Polarstern expedition Lohafex gives new insights into plankton ecology - Little atmospheric carbon dioxide bound in the Southern Ocean - AWI. In: awi.de. Retrieved December 17, 2019 .