Mark Weber
Group: Sara, Heather, Daisy, Edgar
Sed./Strat., Fall 2015
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF NEW DEVELOPMENT AND GLOBAL CHANGES ON SAN SALVADOR ISLAND
The unique position of this island provides an excellent spot for diving among the other enjoyments a Bahama island has to offer. Businesses would like to exploit this aspect by making it a big vacation spot, which means an increase in human population and all the ‘civilization’ requirements they would need. But this island also has another unique aspect, it’s made of carbonate. This is important due to the dissolution characteristics of carbonate leading to a great concern for the future of the island.
This is more important to San Salvador Island due to the soil lost when the mahogany forests were removed for the slave plantations that did not last long. The loss of the protective layer increased the area of carbonate on the island allowing changes to have a larger impact than before.
Such as, carbonate dissolution by low pH being a concern should an increase in population occur due to all the fossil burning toys they would use and resulting CO2 emissions that would occur. CO2 lowers pH and this is of great concern to a carbonate island.
Also should there be a larger population, they would be drawing more of the ground water. This could result in a lowering of the water table and cause salt water to infiltrate in and contaminate wells making it difficult to sustain a large population on the island. Along with this, even though carbonate dissolution by high salinity has a very small effect on the rate of dissolution, so should sea water infiltrate into the island enough it could become a concern worth mentioning.
Sadly even maintaining a small population may not be enough to help this island as increasing CO2 concentrations from the rest of the world into the atmosphere are partly absorbed by the oceans. This is globally changing the oceans pH and may cripple the growth of all carbonate islands on this planet.