Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire (D) ordered state agencies on Tuesday to take steps to address the ocean’s increasing acidity, making it the first state to adopt a policy to take on what scientists describe as a growing environmental concern.

Ocean acidification poses a threat to the state’s $270 million shellfish industry, as well as to critical habitat off its shores.

The shells of some marine snails are dissolving as the seas around Antarctica become more acidic, threatening the food chain, according to a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

Oceans soak up about a quarter of the carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere each year; as CO2 levels in the atmosphere increase from the burning of fossil fuels, so do ocean levels, making seas more acidic. This acidification threatens coral reefs, marine ecosystems and wildlife.

The shells of marine snails – known as pteropods – living in the seas around Antarctica are being dissolved by ocean acidification according to a new study published this week in the journal Nature Geoscience.  These tiny animals are a valuable food source for fish and birds and play an important role in the oceanic carbon cycle*.

During a science cruise in 2008, researchers from British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and the University of East Anglia (UEA), in collaboration with colleagues from the US Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), discovered severe dissolution of the shells of living pteropods in Southern Ocean waters.

Scientists have known for years that greenhouse gasses are altering the chemical makeup of our oceans.

More and more carbon dioxide is dissolving into salt water, creating carbonic acid. That changes the ocean’s pH, or acid-alkaline balance.

And it’s hitting harder in Alaska.

On Monday, Congress was called on by a leading environmental organization to address the increasing threat to sea life that has been caused by decades of warming ocean temperatures and C02 pollution.

The action by Center for Biological Diversity included submitting a detailed letter to the House of Natural Resources Committee, the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee.