Building a Resilient Coast – Perspectives on Climate Change in Maine

Linda Mercer: Maine has an incredibly diverse and valuable commercial fishery and recreational fishery as well. We know that climate change is going to have an effect on all of the species out there in the Gulf of Maine, whether it’s food chain impacts, or actual impacts to distribution of different species. The fact is scientists really can’t predict at this time what the impacts will be on any particular species, including lobsters. The biology of the animals is very complex, and the models that are used to predict climate change are, for the most part, done at a very large scale and can’t predict the finer scale changes that we will see in a water body such as the Gulf of Maine. But, I think the clear thing is there will be changes, there will be impacts. Likely some positive and likely some negative.