SAN FRANCISCO, June 4 (UPI) -- Changing climate in coming decades will severely threaten marine life and coastal regions in Northern California, scientists warned.
A panel of scientists said global warming could bring rising sea levels and ocean water temperatures, cause marine animals to migrate and bring coastal storms with increased erosion, The San Francisco Chronicle reported Friday.
In a report, scientists said sea level at the mouth of San Francisco Bay has risen 8 inches in the last century, and global warming could raise the level another 29 inches in the next 40 years, the newspaper reported.
"The effects of this rise will play out everywhere," John Largier, a UC Davis oceanographer and chairman of the scientific council that prepared the report, said.
Some ocean species are already adapting to warming waters off the coast, the scientists said.
"There is more and more evidence of rapid adaptation by marine life to changes in the climate so far," Largier said, "but as changes grow greater, adaptation will end, and how much we will lose along the way we can't predict precisely."
