Explanation:
According to European citizens, climate change is one of the major problems the world is facing. Climate change is having impacts on the European marine environments ranging from increases in sea surface temperature, changes in marine biodiversity, rising sea levels, melting polar ice caps and more frequent storms and floods. If we do not take action, climate change will cause more damage and disrupt the functioning of our seas, which supply us with food, raw materials and other vital resources.

Explanation:
European citizens think that climate change is caused by both human activity and natural processes. Natural causes can only explain a part of the climate change. The dominant factor causing our climate to change is the human activity and the related increased concentration of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide. The burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas) and the destruction of forests are the main culprits of global climate change.

Explanation:
The ocean absorbs about 25% of the carbon dioxide emitted to the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels. This large addition is acidifying the oceans. The acidity of seawater has already increased by 30%, corresponding to a pH drop of about 8.2 to 8.1. Calcifying marine organisms such as corals, mollusks, crustaceans and urchins are expected to experience severe stress as their ability to make their calcareous shells and skeletons will be reduced.

Explanation:
Dramatic changes are recorded for the Arctic sea-ice cover. Over the last 30 years summer sea ice extent decreased with 11 % per decade with an acceleration in recent years. The winter sea ice extent is also reducing but at a slower rate of about 3 % per decade. Moreover the length of the melt season has increased by about 20 days over the last 30 years. The average thickness at the end of the melt season decreased 53% over the last 40 years. As a consequence, the remaining ice is much thinner.

Explanation:
Responses are species specific. Many species will move northward with increasing water temperature. A clear shift in distribution is already seen for warm-water copepods (small crustaceans), mussels, several sea snails, barnacles and commercial fishes (e.g. cod and sole). Particular problems occur in areas where the northward distribution is limited, as in the Mediterranean Sea or Black Sea. As a consequence, a large number of endemic species will become endangered and some will go extinct.

Explanation:
Anthropogenic perturbation is expected to accelerate sea level rise. Over the last century sea level has risen by 18-22 cm. For the 21st century the more optimistic estimates predict a rise in sea level with an upper range of around 60 cm while the more pessimistic values, which are based on semi-empirical models, predict a rise in sea level up to 180 cm. Notably these upper limits are under the assumption that the increase in greenhouse gas emissions will not exceed certain values.

Explanation:
The global mean sea surface temperature has increased with approximately 0.6 °C over the last century, being unusually rapid. Warming of the sea surface has even been speeding up in the last 25 years.The warming trend has been much stronger in the European seas compared to the North Atlantic.

Explanation:
Projections of temperature change, based on models, predict an increase in sea surface temperature of 1.5 °C to 4 °C by the end of the 21st century on the European continental shelf. The shelf sea regions will warm substantially more than the open-sea. Simulations suggest that the Baltic Sea surface temperature will experience a mean annual warming of 2 – 4°C, in the North Sea a warming of sea surface temperature with 1.7°C is predicted and in the Bay of Biscay a warming up to 5°C is expected.

Explanation:
Climate change is truly everyone's problem, and everybody is part of the solution. Some actions you can take to limit the increase in greenhouse gases: - Reduce energy use at home and switch to renewable sources of energy - Choose for environmentally friendly ways of transportation - Buy locally sourced food - …