Ocean acidification is a major emergent threat to the ocean, its wildlife and the goods and services they provide. While the international community has committed to ‘minimize and address’ ocean acidification as part of the Sustainable Development Goals, it is unclear how this is to be fulfilled, especially as there are no international agreements explicitly designed to tackle this issue. Ocean acidification is of relevance to the work of several global agreements and makes achieving their goals more difficult. Being largely sectoral, these agreements are restricted in their ability to address ocean acidification holistically, often unable to both minimize and address the issue. This has resulted in a very limited response to ocean acidification that is fragmented across a number of regimes. The 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) has been identified as an agreement that could be used to regulate carbon dioxide emissions and thus mitigate ocean acidification. However, this article argues that a far more pivotal role can be played by UNCLOS, through its creation of a governing framework for ocean acidification. UNCLOS is the one Convention with a mandate broad enough to address ocean acidification in a direct, holistic manner. UNCLOS places a duty on States to both minimize and address ocean acidification through its various provisions that pertain to the protection and preservation of the marine environment and the conservation of marine living resources. The Convention establishes the framework through which ocean governance is to be implemented, which should be understood as extending to ocean acidification. Thus, UNCLOS is uniquely placed to guide a coherent international response.

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《联合国海洋法公约》：海洋酸化的治理框架？

海洋酸化是对海洋，其野生生物及其提供的商品和服务的主要紧急威胁。尽管国际社会已承诺“最小化和解决”海洋酸化问题，并将其作为可持续发展目标的一部分，但目前尚不清楚如何实现这一目标，特别是因为没有明确旨在解决这一问题的国际协议。海洋酸化与若干全球协议的工作有关，使实现其目标更加困难。这些协议在很大程度上是部门性的，因此它们在整体上解决海洋酸化问题的能力受到限制，通常无法同时最小化和解决该问题。这就导致了对海洋酸化的非常有限的反应，这种反应分散在许多制度中。1982年《联合国海洋法公约》（UNCLOS）被确定为可用于调节二氧化碳排放量并因此减轻海洋酸化的协议。但是，本文认为，《海洋法公约》可以通过建立海洋酸化治理框架来发挥更大的关键作用。《海洋法公约》是一项公约，其授权范围足够广泛，可以直接，全面地解决海洋酸化问题。《海洋法公约》规定各国有义务通过其关于保护和维护海洋环境以及保护海洋生物资源的各种规定，尽量减少和解决海洋酸化问题。该公约建立了实施海洋治理的框架，应该理解为延伸到海洋酸化。因此，《联合国海洋法公约》具有独特的地位，可以指导一致的国际反应。