Nocera et al. (2025): The effect of ocean alkalinity enhancement on zooplankton standing stock and community composition in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea: a mesocosm study
Ariadna C. Nocera, Claudia Traboni, Justine Courboulèsz, Filomena Romano, Christos Chantzaras, Iordanis Magiopoulos, Selene Varliero, Arianna Azzellino, Pietro Bazzicalupo, Piero Macchi, Guido Raos, Daniela Basso and Paraskevi Pitta, IN: Marine Environmental Research, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marenvres.2025.107489
Ocean acidification (OA) due to anthropogenic CO₂ emissions has significantly altered ocean chemistry since the industrial era. Ocean alkalinity enhancement (OAE) is an innovative strategy to mitigate excess CO₂, with ocean liming (OL) serving as a potential carbon dioxide removal (CDR) method, through the spreading of Ca(OH)₂ (slaked lime) at the ocean surface. This study examined the ecological effects of OL on a natural zooplankton community from the ultraoligotrophic Eastern Mediterranean Sea during a 14-day mesocosm experiment conducted in spring-summer. The authors investigated how varying concentrations of slaked lime (low: 0.00074 g L−1, high: 0.0067 g L−1) affected zooplankton community structure, abundance, composition and species diversity.