Conservation and restoration efforts alone – crucial though they are – are not enough to protect and regenerate vital ocean ecosystems on which people, business, and nature rely. How, then, can we ensure that the ocean isn’t just protected against misuse, but treated in such a way that allows it to actively regenerate? The circular economy offers a framework for such a transformation.
Co-written from two small seaside villages in the United Kingdom – on the easternmost tip of the Isle of Wight and at the edge of Belfast Lough in Northern Ireland – by Emma Elobeid and Tansy Robertson-Fall
“It was Christmas Day. I was in the Southern Ocean beneath Australia. The conditions were horrendous. I was approaching a part in the ocean that was 2,000 miles away from the nearest town. The nearest land was Antarctica and the nearest people would be those manning the International Space Station above me. I really was in the middle of nowhere.
You enter a different mode when you head out there. Your boat is your entire world, and what you take with you when you leave is your entire world. No other experience in my life could have given me a better understanding of the definition of the word ‘finite’. Never in life had I ever translated that definition of finite that I felt on board to anything outside of sailing, until I stepped off the boat at the finish line. I connected the dots — our global economy is no different.
The economy is entirely dependent on finite materials. Burning fossil fuels for energy suddenly seemed illogical. Designing things in ways that meant materials would ultimately end up in a landfill, equally troubling. And then there was the damage that was being done to the environment through extraction, undermining its ability to regenerate and provide us with the things we need for life. There had to be a better way.”
––– Ellen MacArthur
Although, as writers, we have not sailed the world's ocean as Ellen has done, her incredible voyage inspired us to take our own journey of exploration into the circular economycircular economyA systems solution framework that tackles global challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution. It is based on three principles, driven by design: eliminate waste and pollution, circulate products and materials (at their highest value), and regenerate nature. and, specifically within this piece, to discover the powerful transformation it can unlock on land and at sea. Living in our respective coastal towns has shown us how the seas that surround us shape so much of our planet's ecosystem and play a vital role in the future of our economy and environment.
We’re all connected to the ocean; it is vital for our survival.
The ocean, the earth, and humanity
It is more than two decades since ‘A Blue Planet’ first introduced the world, in sweeping cinematography, to never-before-filmed marine life and underwater terrains. In 2022, its narrator, Sir David Attenborough left 90 Heads of State at the opening of the United Nations Ocean Conference with a message; it is the ocean that “defines our planet. It sustains us. [...] The air we breathe and the water we consume are ultimately linked to the seas. The ocean drives our weather and stabilises our climate." More than just a spectacular ecosystem in its own right, the ocean is an enabler of life on Earth.
The ocean generates half of the world’s oxygen, sequesters roughly a quarter of human-made carbon emissions, and absorbs more than 90% of the excess heat associated with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Maintaining these essential ecosystem services is crucial to the regulation of our climate and, increasingly, the mitigation of climate change.
It is economically vital too; just as billions rely on the ocean for food, income, and culture, its ecosystems such as kelp forests hold both immense ecological and economic value.
Though there still remains so much to explore of the ocean’s depths, it is undisputed that the ocean is rich in biodiversity; from microscopic organisms to marine megafauna. Each ocean dweller interacts with the underwater environment in ways that help to stabilise the ocean’s temperature, regulate its carbon cycles, support the drift and direction of its currents, and maintain its chemical makeup by mitigating the local impacts of ocean acidification.
This intersection of water and warming, known as the ocean–climate nexus, underscores the ocean’s critical role as the planet’s life support system.
In recognition of the need for urgent action to protect these vast and vital blue spaces, the ocean has started to show up in climate change conversations it had previously been sidelined in, and in 2022 the UN set a target to protect 30% of the global ocean by 2030.
More recently, people around the world celebrated the agreement by UN members to protect the majority of the global ocean – the high seas – that sit outside of national jurisdiction. Each intervention offers fresh hope and renewed optimism, but there is still some work to do before the details of this historic treaty are universally ratified. True transformation takes time.
In the meantime, the ocean is under intense and increasing pressure: already, 2023’s El Niño has led to record-breaking sea surface temperatures, with further impacts expected.
Under water, under threat: a brief history of ocean damage
Our extractive, wasteful, and polluting economy is weakening the ocean’s ability to fulfil critical ecosystem functions. The impact of the linear economylinear economyAn economy in which finite resources are extracted to make products that are used - generally not to their full potential - and then thrown away ('take-make-waste'). upon underwater systems can be mapped against the five direct drivers of global biodiversity loss.
Land and sea use change
Human activity has significantly altered at least 87% of the area of the ocean, and is directly linked to the destruction of ocean habitats and marine biodiversity. This is both the result of actions on land and at sea.
The clearance of land for agricultural expansion, for example, is felt in seas thousands of miles away. Runoff from pesticides and fertilisers enter ocean-bound waterways, disrupting the pH balance of underwater ecosystems and contributing to climate-change-accelerating marine eutrophication. This can be seen in the expansive – and expanding – Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt, an overabundant bloom of seaweed caused by agricultural runoff, climate change, and pollution which is currently threatening marine wildlife and human health alike.
Marine ecosystems are negatively impacted by coastal and underwater critical infrastructure development such as subsea communication cables. Our current linear model also indirectly impacts our ocean spaces as bigger shipments of more material goods require bigger ships to be built and expanded ports for them to sail into. The sea is used, too, as a setting for water desalination and marine energy technologies; each, to varying degrees, disrupt habitats and displace the species that rely on them.
Overexploitation
In 2019, humanity was using nature and its resources at rates 1.75 times faster than the planet’s ecosystems can regenerate. This overexploitation is a direct and indirect consequence of our current take-make-waste economy.
The land-based extraction of the earth’s resources beyond the realms of nature’s own replenishment cycles has many indirect climate impacts on ocean health. In addition, the overexploitation of flora and fauna on land also has corresponding impacts on ocean ecosystems. Loss of tree cover from extensive deforestation, for example, causes topsoil to run into streams, rivers, and ultimately the ocean. Studies show that these sedimentation responses to deforestation also trigger land-to-ocean transportation of organic matter which has a negative impact on the stability of marine biogeochemical cycles.
Deforestation is hard to miss; the decimation of land-based ecosystems is widely felt and extensively seen in everything from media coverage to school geography textbooks.
At sea, overexploitation is, while less visible, no less extensive.
Fish are often the first thought: the Global Fishing Index estimates that worldwide fish stocks have been depleted to less than 40% of their pre-industrial fishing population. Other experts suggest the loss could be even greater. Much of this loss has been fuelled by destructive practices such as deep ocean trawling – an indiscriminate method of industrial fishing that has an enormous negative impact on ocean sediment and marine habitats.
Beyond food, humans extract vast amounts of materials from the ocean. As well as the obvious – such as offshore drilling for crude oil – many other industries overexploit the ocean’s resources: from aquatic organisms used for nutraceuticals (marine-derived health and beauty products including collagen supplements) to minerals and metals which supply everyday electronics.
Ocean spaces are more frequently being looked to for materials cultivation. As land-based sources run low, deep sea phosphate reserves are being mined to sustain the conventional global agricultural system. Meanwhile, sand and marine aggregates are dredged from seabeds to be turned into concrete, transport infrastructure, and glass. The adverse impacts of excavations span multiple scales: from the loss of specific species and physical damage of marine ecosystems which provide essential climate regulating services, to the release of harmful contaminants into the water column.
Climate change
Anthropogenic climate change is already evident in the temperatures, movement patterns, oxygen saturation, acidity, and sea levels of our one global ocean, causing coastal darkening, coral bleaching, and many impacts in between. Each emission-driven symptom has a corresponding root cause in the linear economy.
Almost half of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are a result of the way we produce and use materials, including food; the rest come from the ways we produce energy. The linear food system alone is responsible for the release of over a third of all anthropogenic GHG emissions. Physical distance from the ocean is irrelevant: sprawling Kansas cattle farms, vast central China rice fields, and giant food processing plants in Brazil each threaten marine biodiversity and ecosystem function through the emissions they generate.
As it is on land, so it is at sea.
Although industrial farming of fish and aquatic organisms has fewer direct GHG emissions than other animal proteins – equivalent to 4% of global food production – there are other indirect emissions. For example, a major ingredient of the feed required to sustain the 214 million tonnes of fisheries and aquaculture output is soybean – one of the world’s largest single crop contributors to climate change. Meanwhile, the diet of livestock – including methane-producing Kansas cattle as well as other farmed animals – are sometimes supplemented with fishmeal protein. Similarly, Chinese rice paddies may be fortified with fertiliser extracted from underwater sedimentary phosphate reserves off the Gulf of Mexico. Each example further highlights the land–ocean interconnections.
Pollution
Waste and pollution are symptoms of the linear economy.
Plastics are a prominent land-based example. Approximately 11 million tonnes of plastic end up in the ocean each year; an amount expected to nearly triple by 2040. Seven years ago, research warned that, without urgent systems transformation, there would be more plastic than fish in the sea by 2050. At the latest scientific estimate, there are now thought to be over 170 trillion plastic particles floating in the world’s ocean.
Other pollutants pervade and persist too. Novel entities – the collective name given to the planetary boundary of chemical pollution – from land-based industry, mining, and agriculture have devastating consequences on water quality as they wash down into the sea, disrupting habitats and further contributing to the breakdown of marine ecosystems.
Pollution can also flow in the opposite direction.
It can occur at sea and impact aquatic and terrestrial environments alike. Offshore drilling for oil and gas releases high levels of GHG emissions and other air pollutants into the atmosphere, damaging the entire planetary system. Nutrient pollution discharged from industrial aquaculture, for example, can cause localised algal blooms which are toxic to humans and animals as well as marine life.
Invasive alien species
The ability of the ocean to function as the planet’s ecological support system is threatened by the unintentional introduction – and then uncontrolled spread – of species that are not native to a particular area. In the wrong place, these species can disrupt the ecological balance by dominating vulnerable ecosystems, degrading water quality, spreading diseases, and in the worst case triggering extinctions.
Some invasive alien species spread across the ocean on the products of the linear economy: marine litter acts as a vector for mollusc migration and man-made flotsam enables the long-distance rafting of coral polyps from one ecosystem to another. As 90% of the world’s goods travel across the ocean surface, so do bits of biodiversity: from algae hitchhiking on ship hulls to crustaceans being forcibly migrated from one area of the ocean and expelled into another via ballast water.
It’s not just marine organisms that make these unwitting transoceanic journeys. Land-based insects and pests, too, travel on the material trappings of a linear economy, threatening the terrestrial ecosystems of their final destination.
Other introductions are intentional, even if the consequences are not. Global aquaculture is a fast-growing supply sector; industrial scale operations that intensively farm non-native species without considering the impact on local waters risk the accidental spread of invasive alien species which can dominate and disrupt the delicate balance of surrounding ecosystems.
The call of the sea is intensifying; it's time to change how we do things in order to safeguard vital ecosystems and the function of the ocean in maintaining life on earth.
Time to take action
Actions to halt and reverse the negative impacts of the linear economy on the ocean often begin with conservation – ring-fencing areas not to be touched by the economy but left for nature.
Conservation efforts have shown progress is possible: since 2000, waters covered by marine protected areas (MPAs) have increased almost tenfold, accounting for 6.35% of the global ocean. Studies show positive effects, largely from increased abundance in fish biomasses due to reduced fishing pressure. More recently, the High Seas Treaty formalised an agreement that aims to protect even more of these shared ocean spaces – 30% by 2030.
While widely – and rightly – celebrated as a watershed moment, it is important to highlight the limits as well as the merits of a conservation approach. Research into the long-term effectiveness of MPAs acknowledges that they are not enough to offset the larger scale biotic alterations associated with increasing climate change. However, marine biodiversity doesn’t behave at the behest of national jurisdictions, so we also need multilateral action that provides protection against the misuse of the remaining 70% not covered by the High Seas Treaty.
At sea there is continual motion. The very nature of the ocean’s tidal flows and constant currents mean that while protecting designated habitats is a vital part of the picture, pockets of intervention can only take us so far. We cannot reduce emissions, tackle pollution, or target waste in some areas while continuing to pursue extraction and overexploitation in others. The whole system needs to change.
While we desperately need more conservation, we also need to go beyond conservation.
Just as transformation on land requires us to think about the whole system rather than siloed strategies, halting and reversing ocean biodiversity loss at the scale required to enable regeneration requires a holistic approach.
To tackle the threats to the ocean ecosystem at their root in ways that address each of the five drivers of biodiversity loss, we need to make fundamental changes to how our economy works. That means transitioning away from the linear extractive and wasteful model to a circular economy in which: waste and pollution are eliminated, reducing threats to nature; products and materials are kept in use, leaving more space for nature; and nature is regenerated, allowing ecosystems to thrive.
Importantly, because of the codependencies between green and blue spaces, this transformation needs to happen on land and at sea in harmony.
Eliminate waste and pollution to reduce threats to nature
In a circular economy, waste and pollution are designed out – they are eliminated.
The global food system is one of the most wasteful and polluting sectors in a linear economy – responsible for over a third of GHG emissions. Changing this food system to one based on the principles of the circular economy can help tackle climate change and build biodiversity while meeting nutritional needs.
Though conventional agriculture practised on industrial scales, expansive commercial fisheries, and intensive aquaculture each look very different, these land- and sea-based food systems have some common ways of operating.
They also have more positive parallels: they all hold a potential for transformation and capacity for regeneration.
Eliminating pollutants from a land-based food system – synthetic fertilisers from fruit farming, chemical pesticides from pepper production, hazardous substances from packaging – prevents runoff from polluting waterways and entering the ocean.
The same is true at sea. Eliminating fertilisers, chemical additives, and artificial inputs from aquaculture production (whether for food or other products) prevents harmful substances from leaking into surrounding water and disrupting neighbouring ecosystems.
Applying similar design-led elimination strategies – from solid format shampoo to compostable food casings – across the entire economy can also directly cut GHG emissions associated with production, packaging, and post-use processes from materials and products of every kind.
In reducing these waste and pollution-related threats to the ocean, we also drastically reduce the pressure on above water and underwater ecosystems.
Circulate products and materials to leave room for nature
Many of the transversal threats facing the ocean stem from the simple fact that, in a linear economy, too many products are used too few times or not for long enough. By designing and building things differently, a circular economy can help meet society’s needs with far fewer virgin resources.
Adopting reusereuseThe repeated use of a product or component for its intended purpose without significant modification. models for plastic packaging alone can reduce not only the volume of plastic in the ocean but consequently harm to marine wildlife, level of pollution, and amount of debris upon which invasive alien species can be transported.
Circulating products and materials within the economy isn’t just about keeping them out of the environment – our blue spaces should also be protected from extraction and overexploitation.
Each time we prioritise models that avoid the extraction of natural resources, we are better able to leave room for the recovery and prosperity of nature beneath and above water.
In a circular economy, this involves applying principles of reuse, repairrepairOperation by which a faulty or broken product or component is returned back to a usable state to fulfil its intended use., remanufacturing, and recycling (or where appropriate, compostingcompostingMicrobial breakdown of organic matter in the presence of oxygen.) to everything from durable household goods to everyday electronic devices for the benefit of biodiversity. Applying reuse models in the built environment, for example – the main global consumer of sand – can help reduce demand for seabed extraction by extending the value embedded in those materials which already exist.
Some of these same principles exist in ocean industries too: from reusable fishing pots, nets, and lines to remanufactured marine equipment and rented water sports apparel. Meanwhile, methods are being developed to make use of plastic waste recovered from the sea into walkways and platforms for aquaculture facilities.
Other initiatives turn the high volume of waste byproducts from marine industries into high-value products for use on land: fish scales into functional surfaces, Tilapia skins into fashion accessories, collagen into cosmetics, and even chitosan extracted from crustacean waste into wound care and vital medicines. However, many of these enterprises involve high-tech, energy-intensive processes. Therefore, while waste-to-wealth initiatives form part of a circular economy at sea, just as they do a circular economy on land, they do not represent a total systems solution to the challenges our oceans are facing.
More – much more – is needed.
Accelerating the transition towards a circular economy, which tackles each systemic challenge at scale, is therefore vital to address the ocean’s overlapping crises.
In part 2 of ‘The circular economy at sea’, publishing on World Ocean Day 2023, we discuss the vital third principle of the circular economy – regenerating nature. By adapting ocean operations according to circular principles, we can actively help to regenerate our shared blue spaces.
All photographs supplied by: Theo Vickers Marine Wildlife Photography
Continue reading with part 2
The circular economy at sea: regenerating the world’s life support system is a two-part article series.
