Underwater catastrophe

Ocean acidification, one of the world's most important climate-change challenges, must not be left off the agenda at the United Nations Copenhagen conference, the world's science academies said this week.

Ocean acidification is expected to cause massive corrosion of coral reefs and dramatic changes in the makeup of the biodiversity of oceans and to have significant implications for food production.

The warning was made in a joint statement published by the Royal Society (the UK national academy of science) and the academies of 69 other countries around the world.

Martin Rees, president of the Royal Society, said: 'Everybody knows that the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere leads to climate change. 

'But it has another environmental effect - ocean acidification - which hasn't received much political attention.