“Thursday’s announcement, by the small Pacific island nation of Palau, that it is designating a 193,000-square-mile fully protected marine reserve is dramatic in its own right. It would be the sixth largest such area in the world, and would help protect over a thousand species of fish and some 700 species of coral.
But in context, the news is even more momentous — it means the world has now announced plans to set aside over 1 million square miles of highly protected ocean in 2015 alone, more than during any prior year, according to figures provided by the Pew Charitable Trusts. This is a gigantic area, bigger than Alaska and Texas combined.”
the happy environmentalist 