Antoine de Ramon N'Yeurt

University of the South Pacific | USP · Pacific Centre for Environment and Sustainable Development (PaCE-SD)

While the rise in global ocean temperature continues its course, reaching 1.45+/- 0.12 °C above pre-industrial level according to the World Meteorological Organization in 2023, marine heat waves frequencies and intensities increase. Consequently, coral reef ecosystems which are among the most vulnerable environments are strongly impacted with dystr...

Located in the heart of the South Pacific Ocean, the French Polynesian islands represent a remarkable setting for biological colonization and diversification, because of their isolation. Our knowledge of this region’s biodiversity is nevertheless still incomplete for many groups of organisms. In the late 1990s and 2000s, a series of publications pr...

This study uses a community-based assessment in conjunction with the integrated catchment management and community capitals frameworks to explore the iTaukei (indigenous Fijian) knowledge systems relative to the management of natural resources in the villages in the Waimanu Catchment. The iTaukei knowledge systems encompassing traditional beliefs,...

Sargassum C. Agardh is a highly diverse genus within the brown algae, with 615 currently recognized species, varieties and forms worldwide. This high level of species diversity led early taxonomists, using morphological-anatomical criteria only, to divide the genus into up to five sub-genera and several lower-ranking taxonomic units (e.g., sections...

Though natural resources are abundantly available for utilization of renewable energy sources, many Pacific Island countries continue to rely on fossil fuels. The use of fossil fuels is known to significantly contribute to climate change. Heavy reliance on fossil fuels also hinders the economic development of most of the Pacific Island Countries. T...

The Copernicus Ocean State Report is an annual publication of the Copernicus Marine Service, established in 2014 by the European Commission for Copernicus 1 and renewed in 2021 for Copernicus 2. The report provides a comprehensive, state-of-the-art, scientific overview on the current conditions, natural variations, and ongoing changes in the global...

A community-based assessment along with a water quality framework was used to explore the Waimanu River water quality and to determine the impacts of the water quality on the communities which rely on the river for livelihood, sustenance, and recreation. Since both climatic and non-climatic factors affect the river system, the study used rainfall v...

We re-evaluated the diversity of Lobophora using an integrative taxonomic approach based on a broad sampling across French Polynesian archipelagos. Our results show that French Polynesia supports at least 37 Lobophora species of which ~57% (21) are endemic. This level of endemicity is comparable to that presently known in the Caribbean and the west...

The impacts of environmental conditions (temperature, salinity, and nutrients) on growth, semi-refined carrageenan yield, gel strengths, and viscosity were assessed on the red seaweed Kappaphycus alvarezii in laboratory culture. Results showed that K. alvarezii had a higher daily growth rate (0.94% day⁻¹) at higher temperature (30 °C). Its semi-ref...

This paper uses a holistic approach within a catchment scale, through the application of both climatic and non-climatic parameters, to analyze the impacts of river floods on the human security needs of rural riverine communities in the Waimanu Catchment situated in Nausori, Fiji. Consideration of both climatic and non-climatic factors is required s...

Tropical coral reefs are both biologically diverse and economically important ecosystems, yet are under threat globally, facing a multitude of stressors including global warming, ocean acidification, nutrient loading, over-fishing and sedimentation. Reef building corals precipitate an aragonite skeleton (CaCO3), which forms the base of the coral re...

Global climate change is known to have affected government, Churches and people’s livelihood, health, well-being and sustainability worldwide. In the literature, although the impacts of climate change on these indicators are clear, no model was developed to address the relationship between them and how to use it to help build better Resilience (Cli...

A floristic survey of the marine algal biodiversity of Antsiranana Bay, northern Madagascar, was conducted during November 2018. This represents the first inventory encompassing the three major macroalgal classes (Phaeophyceae, Florideophyceae and Ulvophyceae) for the little-known Malagasy marine flora. Combining morphological and DNA-based approac...

Our team found interconnected opportunities with two approaches addressing human and climate issues. The two approaches update our 2012 proposal to grow more seaweed to simultaneously solve the problems of feeding the world, fueling the world, and reversing climate change. We discovered these approaches during our work on the U.S. Department of Ene...

How to sustainably and equitably reverse global warming by 2150 Energies journal publishes a comprehensive analysis of how to restore the world's climate to pre-industrial levels while supporting UN Sustainable Development Goals. Addressing the multiple crises of rising atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide rise, increasing global temperatures, an...

Unless humanity achieves United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 and restores the relatively stable climate of pre-industrial CO 2 levels (as early as 2140), species extinctions, starvation, drought/floods, and violence will exacerbate mass migrations. This paper presents conceptual designs and techno-economic analyses to calcul...

This document provides additional supporting Information for the main publication, "Restoring pre-industrial CO2 levels while achieving Sustainable Development Goals" (https://doi.org/10.3390/en13184972). It lists abbreviations used in this supplementary document and in the main publication. It also contains 24 figures and 1 table in addition to th...

Seagrasses provide a wide range of services including food provision, water purification and coastal protection. Pacific small island developing states (PSIDS) have limited natural resources, challenging economies and a need for marine science research. Seagrasses occur in eleven PSIDS and nations are likely to benefit in different ways depending o...

The AdjustaDepth TechnoEconomic Analysis was prepared by Mark E. Capron PE, Co-PI, under the direction of Kelly Lucas, PhD, PI and submitted April 3, 2019 to U.S. Department of Energy ARPA-E under Phase 1 Contract DE-AR0000916. Its 33 tabs present the cost and yield projections for growing Gracilaria tikvahiae in the Gulf of Mexico. It can be adapt...

Distant-source swells are known to regularly inundate low-lying Pacific Island communities. Here we examine extreme total water level (TWL) and inundation, driven by a distant-source swell on Fiji’s Coral Coast using observations and a phase-resolving wave model (XBeach). The objective of this study is to increase understanding of swell-driven haza...

A framework is presented with examples of technologies capable of achieving carbon neutrality while sequestering sufficient CO2 to ensure global temperature rise less than 1.5°C (after a small overshoot), then continuing to reduce CO2 levels to 300 ppm within a century. Two paths bracket the continuum of opportunities including dry, sustainable, te...

This supplement to to the preprint, "Restoring pre-industrial CO2 levels while achieving Sustainable Development Goals" by Capron et al. (doi/10.1002/essoar.10503397.1, June 2020) provides supporting details for the analyses presented in the preprint. The main supplement is a spreadsheet available at https://osf.io/ag53p (DOI 10.17605/OSF.IO/AG53P)...

This supplement provides additional background information for a paper entitled Restoring pre-industrial CO2 levels while achieving Sustainable Development Goals, which is currently undergoing peer review.

In the Pacific, the capacity of curriculum writers for integrating the content of climate change into their curricula and/or taught Resilience [Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) & Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)] in education is limited. This paper described the findings of a 2018 study on the integration of climate change into primary and secondary sc...

The coral reefs of French Polynesia (FP) have experienced repeated macroalgal blooms over the last decades. These events have prompted intense efforts in fundamental and applied research on macroalgae in this ecoregion, especially regarding species of the order Fucales (Turbinaria ornata and Sargassum pacificum). Recently, however, these proliferat...

Increasing South Pacific aquaculture with complete ecosystems: This talk is organized to explain: • The global scale and basic principles of total ecosystem aquaculture; • An example application in Laucala Bay, Fiji; • The kinds of research needed to manage and adapt the ecosystems. Total ecosystem aquaculture can sustain global food security via s...

Reversing climate change within 100 years: The scale to restore natural CO2 levels while achieving sustainable development goals. First – Developing country coastal communities build floating flexible seaweed forests to provide local food and export income. Second – Developing countries build trash collection and hydrothermal liquefaction systems....

Agriculture is a very important sector in Pacific Island Countries (PICs), providing a significant source of food and income for households as well as substantially contributing to national economies. Agriculture is climatically sensitive, and climate change poses major threats to the continued productivity of this critically important sector in th...

Monitoring potentially devastating coral-eating crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS) populations at scales relevant to management is a challenging task. Here, we investigated a citizen science approach to detect COTS outbreaks and prioritize management responses. Between 2014 and 2018, 38 000 COTS were recorded through 641 online observation reports sub...

Dossier thématique "Le Pacifique en première ligne face au changement climatique" - Article disponible ici : http://journals.openedition.org/jso/11057 - Résumé : Cette synthèse met en question l’idée généralement acceptée selon laquelle les sociétés du Pacifique sont toutes condamnées, à plus ou moins brève échéance, à un avenir incertain malgré le...

This study uses an explanatory design to investigate the role of primary education in addressing climate change in primary schools in Fiji. A self-administered questionnaire (N = 30) was conducted with primary school teachers from 14 primary schools in Fiji. Using frequency analysis, all teachers perceived that addressing climate change at a much y...

AdjustaDepth Project was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy to design an artificial reef system for growing and harvesting seaweed for advanced sustainable biofuels. The team discovered that the system grows more seaweed per hectare when it is part of a complete ecosystem with shellfish, finfish, and...

Ce dossier thématique met en perspective les données et prévisions scientifiques, souvent inquiétantes, concernant les impacts socio-environnementaux du changement climatique dans le Pacifique Sud avec des travaux qui analysent comment les populations de cette région les appréhendent – à la fois en tant qu'ensemble de phénomènes physiques et en tan...

A relic inshore reef ecosystem adjacent to the Fijian capital of Suva and another remote inshore reef were monitored monthly from July 2014 to July 2015 for coral recruitment, sedimentation rates, coral cover, temperature, and light intensity. Despite a major sewage spill in Suva Harbour in December 2014, the municipal inshore site exposed to const...

Fiji became independant from the United Kingdom on 10th October 1970 and declared itself a Republic on 7th October 1987. Over half the population is rural with many communities relying on small scale commercial and subsistence fishing. About 75% of the dietary protein is sourced from the ocean. Tourism is the major source of foreign income, with mo...

The US Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) MacroAlgae Research Inspiring Novel Energy Research (MARINER) program is encouraging technologies for the sustainable harvest of large funding research of macroalgae for biofuels at less than $80 per dry metric ton (DMT). The Ocean Forests team, led by the University of S...

Due to anthropogenic pressure, seagrass habitats are declining by over 7% annually worldwide, with approximately 29% of the world seagrass stock having already been destroyed. Losses in seagrass habitats for the tropical Pacific by the year 2100 are estimated to be between 5 to 35%, but a lack of knowledge on the extent and area cover of seagrass r...

Sugarcane is an economically important crop in Fiji as it has considerable impact on the gross domestic product and around 22% (200,000) of the population is directly or indirectly dependent on the sugarcane industry. Considering the importance of this crop, a life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed in order to understand environmental impacts. I...

We present the most comprehensive genetic characterization to date of five Fijian island populations: Viti Levu, Vanua Levu, Kadavu, the Lau Islands, and Rotuma, including non-recombinant Y (NRY) chromosome and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplotypes and haplogroups. As a whole, Fijians are genetically intermediate between Melanesians and Polynesians,...

The study was performed to study the effect of producing ethanol from molasses or sugarcane juice to blend with gasoline and produce E10 fuel for the Fijian car fleet. Two cases were developed to assess the economic and environmental impacts of producing ethanol from these feedstocks and blending with imported motor spirit. It was found to offer ma...

La flore marine des îles Marquises comptait, jusqu'à l'expédition Pakaihi i te Moana 2011, une dizaine d'espèces connues. Depuis cette date, 144 espèces (à l'exclusion des Corallinales et des Peysson-nelia*) ont été identifiées dans les neuf îles étudiées. Parmi ces espèces on compte 94 Rhodophyta (algues rouges), 38 espèces de Chlorophyta (algues...

Since 2011, the small South Pacific atoll nation of Tuvalu has been affected by algal blooms, the most recent being a large growth of the brown alga Sargassum on the main atoll of Funafuti. The gravity of the situation led to an invitation to the authors from the Tuvalu Government to conduct an initial survey of the problem in November 2013. The bl...

Climate change is forcing farmers in Small Island Developing States to find novel methods to maintain crop productivity. Past practices using chemical fertilizers and poor waste management severely damaged many coastal areas, leading to an ecosystem shift towards algal dominance. In this chapter, the authors propose an approach to deal with this is...

Pacific coasts are constantly changing as a result of natural processes such as tides, strong currents, rain, storm surges, strong wind, cyclones and sea level rise. With increasing human activities within the coastal areas in terms of human settlement, land use changes, flow of solid and liquid waste and coastal developments such as beach ramps, j...

The effects of Climate Change are forcing farmers in Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to find novel methods to maintain crop productivity and sustainability. Past practices using chemical fertilizers and poor waste management severely damaged many coastal areas, leading to an ecosystem shift towards algal dominance. A proposed approach to deal...

A total of 34 marine algae are reported for the first time based on historical herbarium collections from the marine shores of Tonga in the central South Pacific Ocean: eight Rhodophyta and 26 Chlorophyta. One species of Rhodophyta, i.e. Trichogloea requienii, and four species of Chlorophyta, i.e. Caulerpa plumulifera, Codium extricatum, Udotea gla...

An investigation into an overabundant seaweed problem in Funafuti atoll, Tuvalu indicated the cause to be the brown alga Sargassum polycystum, a likely introduced species through inter-island shipping cargo vessels. There was a strong link between anthropogenic nutrient inputs and the distribution of the alga along the shorelines of the densely pop...

Ocean Afforestation, more precisely Ocean Macroalgal Afforestation (OMA), has the potential to reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations through expanding natural populations of macroalgae, which absorb carbon dioxide, then are harvested to produce biomethane and biocarbon dioxide via anaerobic digestion. The plant nutrients remaining after...

Background/Question/Methods Pacific Islands (PI) communities have endured countless changes over millennia and have managed to balance their abilities to survive and safeguard traditional ecological knowledge (TEK). More recently, more communities throughout the Pacific Islands Region are dealing with the impact of climate change as they plan for...

The present survey was undertaken to provide the first census of the marine flora (macroalgae and seagrasses) of Baa Atoll, one of the 26 Maldivian atolls, and to serve along with the macro-fauna biodiversity inventories for conservation purposes. Species collection and inventories have been conducted at 27 sites covering the widest selection of ha...

A rapid vulnerability and adaptation (V&A) assessment was carried by a team of four staff and two Masters Students in Health from the Pacific Centre for Environment and Sustainable Development (PACE-SD), the University of the South Pacific (USP), from the 23rd to the 31st of October 2011. Three priority villages consisting of six sites were identif...

This third paper in a monographic series on the marine macroalgae of French Polynesia gives a detailed coverage of the species of Rhodophyta occurring in these islands. A total of 197 taxa are presented (195 Rhodophyceae, 1 Phaeophyceae and 1 Chlorophyta; of these, 84 (or 43%) represent new records for the flora, while 7 (or 3.6%) are new species....