Coal spill risk to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef

Any major coal spill on Australia’s Gr-eat Barrier Reef could kill some colourful corals within two weeks and stunt the growth of fish and seagr-ass, a new study revealed on Tuesday. While coal spills are rare, environmentalists have been increasingly concerned about the risks to the reef from ships carrying the commodity mined in Queensland state through its waters.

The study, published in Nature Scientific Reports, is the first to examine the effect of fine coal particles on tropical marine organisms. “Results demonstrate that chronic coal exposure can cause considerable lethal effects on corals, and reductions in seagrass and fish growth rates,” it said.

In experiments in which marine species were expos-ed to varying levels of fine coal particles, the researc-hers found that it had a “smothering” impact on corals, co-author Mia Hoog-enboom said. Ms Hoogenb-oom, from Australia’s Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, said there was a stickiness to coal dust which formed a film on coral which light struggled to penetrate.

“From our study it was the coral that was the most vulnerable, where we saw extensive mortality of the coral tissue,” she said. “For the sea grass and the fish we saw lower levels of mortality but we did see significant impacts on their growth rates.”

Queensland state environment minister Steven Miles moved to reassure people, saying the reef was “the most strictly regulated shipping area in the world”.

The transit of coal thro-ugh the marine park was not, he stressed, the biggest threat to the reef.