This month, Our Planet Our Future’s Sustainability Book Club took a deep dive into the ocean with Helen Czerski’s Blue Machine: How the Ocean Works. The book explores the ocean, presenting it as a vast, dynamic system that shapes our planet and our lives.
From currents and waves to the movement of heat and nutrients, Czerski presents the ocean as a powerful ‘machine’. The ocean regulates the climate, supports marine life, and has had a surprising influence on human history. Blending science with storytelling, she brings to life the hidden mechanisms that reveal just how essential the ocean is in maintaining the Earth’s balance.
We agreed the book’s fascinating facts and scientific explanations left us with a newfound appreciation of the ocean.
Quirky facts of the deep sea
Blue Machine is packed with accounts of the author’s experiences studying the high seas, historical scientific experiments and quirky facts. Did you know that whales don’t have external ears which means their earwax can’t escape? Extracting and examining it reveals how much stress they were under during WWII.
And did you know that, if you cut yourself ten meters below the ocean’s surface, you’ll bleed green due to the way light is absorbed underwater?
Or that if you dropped a grain of sand in the deep ocean it falls a metre a second and would take three hours to reach the deepest point?
Bioluminescence and ocean highways
Because light doesn’t penetrate the ocean depths, organisms have developed a variety of mechanisms including bioluminescence to illuminate themselves and the area around them.
Czerski introduced us to ocean highways — currents that transport particles and life across surprisingly vast distances. Giant tortoises likely ended up on the Galápagos Islands by floating hundreds of miles from South America on ocean currents. In 2004, an Aldabra giant tortoise was discovered in Tanzania, having drifted over 450 miles from the Seychelles.
White gold and ocean flows
We also discovered that nutrient-rich ‘white gold’ fuelled farming productivity but also led to environmental degradation, how disrupted ocean flows have blocked ships and set the course for wars, and that the energy required to heat just one cubic metre of water by 1°C is enough to shoot an SUV several metres into the air!
The ocean and the climate crisis
While most of the book deliberately sidesteps the damage that humans are doing to the ocean, the final chapter touches on the complex implications of climate change. Over 90% of all the additional energy generated by human-induced climate change is absorbed by the ocean as heat, which is leading to catastrophic effects.
We discussed the Global Ocean Treaty, which aims to protect 30% of the oceans by 2030 through Marine Protected Areas. While 110 countries have signed the treaty, a further 42 need to ratify it, including the UK.
There is a documentary series about this book, with the first episode now on the Cosmic Shambles website. Helen Czerski has published another book, Storm in a Teacup, which we’re also keen to read.
Find out more about Helen Czerski here.
Our next event
On the 24th of April, we’ll discuss Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, which is available at Hertfordshire Libraries, Audible, Borrow Box and in hard copy. Book your free spot here.
About Our Planet Our Future’s Environment Book Club
Our Planet Our Future, our landmark series of talks and events, launched an Environment Book Club in 2023, meeting in Harpenden to discuss sustainability-related reads.