A Consensus Away: Protecting the Southern Ocean

In 2016, the United States and New Zealand helped create the largest marine protected area on Earth: 1.55 million square kilometers of Antarctica’s Ross Sea. The agreement took over a decade of scientific planning and five years of international negotiation. It was a landmark win for ocean conservation and proof that the U.S. could play a leading role in protecting shared global waters.

That was ten years ago. Since then, three more marine protected areas in the Southern Ocean have been proposed, debated, revised, and blocked. The same institution that made the Ross Sea a Marine Protected Area (MPA) possible has failed to designate a single new protected area. This month, after participating in a classroom simulation of the annual The Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) meeting at my university, I wanted to understand what the U.S. stands to gain from pushing these protections forward.

CCAMLR, the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, governs fishing and conservation in the Southern Ocean. It was entered into force in 1982 in response to a surge in industrial krill harvesting that threatened the Antarctic food web. Krill are small, shrimp-like crustaceans that sit at the base of the ecosystem. Penguins, seals, whales, and seabirds all depend on them. Krill also absorb carbon dioxide, storing roughly the same amount of carbon that 35 million cars emit each year. Without krill, the system collapses. Without the system, the climate loses a quiet but significant buffer.

Three proposed MPAs have been on the table for nearly a decade. The East Antarctic MPA, led by Australia, covers areas important for biodiversity and deep-water research The Weddell Sea MPA, proposed by the EU and Germany, would protect one of the most pristine marine basins on the planet. The Antarctic Peninsula MPA, advanced by Chile and Argentina, targets the waters where industrial krill fishing is most concentrated and where penguins and whales come to feed. Together with existing protections, these three MPAs would safeguard roughly 26 percent of the Southern Ocean, nearly 3 percent of the global ocean. The Peninsula MPA alone is backed by more than 150 peer-reviewed studies.

Russia and China have blocked all three since 2016. Thus, at the 44th annual meeting in Hobart, Australia in October 2025, the commission ended in stalemate again. A conservation measure that had distributed krill catches across a broader area lapsed in 2024, concentrating fishing in predator-rich waters near the Peninsula. The result: in 2025, the krill fishery hit its 620,000-tonne quota and closed early for the first time in history.

Rachel Carson wrote about how the sea is a place of shared affairs, where what happens in one current reaches every shore. The Southern Ocean is the purest expression of that idea. Its waters circulate the entire planet. Its krill feed the largest animals alive. Its ice regulates the global climate. Protecting it is an investment in the scientific infrastructure, climate resilience, and diplomatic credibility that the United States needs

The Ross Sea MPA is a case in point. It serves as what scientists call a “living laboratory,” one of the last marine ecosystems on Earth relatively free from human impact. Research conducted there informs climate models, fisheries management, and ecosystem science globally. The MPA’s general protection zone, where no commercial fishing is allowed, covers roughly 72 percent of the total area and supports populations of Adelie penguins, emperor penguins, Ross Sea’ orcas, and Weddell seals. The data generated from this protected baseline is scientifically invaluable. It tells researchers what a healthy Antarctic marine ecosystem looks like so they can measure degradation elsewhere on our planet.

Expanding protections to the Peninsula, the Weddell Sea, and East Antarctica would multiply these benefits. The Southern Ocean drives global ocean circulation and regulates weather patterns that affect agriculture, fisheries, and disaster preparedness in the United States and worldwide. Climate scientists rely on Antarctic ecosystems to understand how warming oceans alter food webs, carbon cycling, and ice dynamics. Every year that these protections are delayed, the baseline shifts. Krill populations around the Antarctic Peninsula have declined dramatically since the 1970s, with some estimates suggesting drops of 70 to 80 percent in parts of the southwest Atlantic. Krill decline causes a domino effect; penguin colonies across the region are shrinking as krill availability declines under the combined pressure of warming seas and industrial fishing.

Rachel Carson also understood that caring for the natural world required more than knowledge. It requires 1) institutions willing to act on it but also 2) a sense of wonder for our great world. Having that curiosity, that willingness to stop and actually look at the world around you, to find it marvelous rather than merely manageable, is what Carson believed could move us towards change. The Southern Ocean is a great test of that principle. Few people will ever see it, as its seas and wildlife exist largely beyond the reach of the ordinary human experience. However, wonder does not require proximity. There has to be a willingness to care about something larger than what is immediately in front of you, and to let that care shape what you do next.

In 2027, such willingness will be tested. The United States will assume the rotating chairmanship of CCAMLR. The chair sets the agenda, manages negotiations, and shapes the tone of the proceedings. It’s a position of procedural influence at a moment when the commission’s credibility is under pressure. The international target of protecting 30 percent of the ocean by 2030 will not be met without progress in the Southern Ocean, which makes up about 10 percent of the global ocean. If CCAMLR cannot deliver on conservation in waters that belong to no single nation, it raises serious questions about whether any international body can govern the global commons effectively.

The U.S. has the capacity to be a leader in conservation: the Ross Sea MPA required high-level diplomacy, sustained scientific investment, and patient negotiation. It required trade-offs. It required compromise with nations that had economic and geopolitical objections But it happened. And the precedent it set has shaped how the world thinks about protecting international waters, including the framework of the recently ratified High Seas Treaty.

The proposals are written, and the science is done. The big question is whether member-countries can allow politics and diplomacy to follow the scientific evidence that our Southern Ocean needs and deserves protection.

Renée Lutterbach – Columbia University

Renée Lutterbach is a Master of International Affairs candidate at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, concentrating in Economic and Political Development with a specialization in Technology, Media, and Communications. She holds a B.A. in Political Science with a minor in Anthropology from Purdue University. Her academic journey includes international study at the National University of Singapore, where she deepened her interest in Southeast Asian sustainability and cross-border environmental governance.