Warming Oceans More Stable, Scientists Says This Is Troubling
WARMING OCEANS – Climate scientists say that global warming currently makes the oceans more stable, adding that this have “profound and troubling” implications.
This also increases surface temperatures and reducing the carbon they can absorb, according to a report from PhilStar.
Man-made climate change has currently increased surface temperatures across the planet. This leads to atmospheric instability and amplifying extreme weather events like storms.
In the oceans, however, it brings a different effect as it slows the mixing between the warming surface and the cooler, oxygen-rich waters below, according to researchers.
Known as ocean “stratification”. this would imply that less deep water is rising towards the surface carrying oxygen and nutrients, while the water at the surface absorbs less atmospheric carbon dioxide to bury at depth.
A report that was published in the journal Nature Climate Change, the international team of climate scientists, shows that they discovered that stratification globally had increased by a “substantial” 5.3% from 1960 to 2018.
Most of this stabilization is happening towards the surface and was attributed largely to temperature rises.
The report also said that the process is also worsened by the melting of sea ice, hence, more fresh water also accumulates on the surface of the ocean.
Based on the report, Michael Mann, a climate science professor at Pennsylvania State University and the co-author of the study, said that the seemingly technical finding has profound and troubling implications. Among them include potentially driving more “intense, destructive hurricanes” as ocean surfaces warm.
Mann also cited the reduction in the amount of CO2 absorbed, which implies the faster building up of carbon pollution in the atmosphere.
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