Scientists warn that oceans are cooling

[CHIMO]

Scientists have discovered dramatic changes in the temperature and salinity of deep waters in the Antarctic region that they warn could have a major impact on global climate.

Expedition leader Steve Rintoul of Australia said his multinational team of researchers had found that waters at the bottom of the "southern ocean" were significantly cooler and less salty than they were 10 years ago.

The "southern ocean" is in the Antarctic region and was delimited from the southern portions of the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean in 2000 by the International Hydrographic Organisation.

Rintoul said the size and speed of the changes surprised scientists, who have long believed deep ocean waters underwent little temperature change, and could indicate a slowdown in the flow of deep water currents.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/49D12577-CF4E-405E-B81A-1DD58A68937C.htm

Temperature, density and salinity.

[rockedthevoteinMA]

1. oh no ...

I know they are worried about the gulf stream in the Atlantic - but this sounds a bit more surprising. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. :scared:

[rodeodance]

2. ice is melting into the oceans--will get cooler. and cooler and cooler

[LiberallyInclined]

40. and since cold water sinks...

it makes sense that the deep water temperatures would be cooling, and also have less salinity- it seems to me that it would indicate that antarctic glaciers are melting at a pretty good clip.

[Psephos]

48. You got that exactly backwards

Meltwater represents a net transfer of thermal energy from the atmosphere into the ocean. On average, it's warmer than the ocean waters into which it flows (some exceptions notwithstanding, due to warm local currents such as the Gulf Stream). In general, meltwater floats due to normal thermal convective processes, for the same reason warm air rises.

It also is far less saline than the ocean, which means it is less dense, which also contributes to its floating. The density difference sets up a gradient barrier which tends to inhibit free mixing.

In short, meltwater does not sink, and does not cool the ocean. Instead, it forms large shallow floating pools that take a long time to thoroughly mix and "disappear," leaving the ocean warmer.

[Old Mouse]

3. The most important thing we need to observe

is the frequency of "scientists" being surprised and shocked. Much of the modeling and prediction is proving erroneous, and seldom in a way that makes one more comfortable about the rate of change.

Climate study is an incredibly new science. Much about the makeup of our global climate is still unknown.

[Eurobabe]

4. Wasn't this a movie out last Memorial Day??

[zann725]

10. Yeah. In the movie, it took a change of about 10 degrees in water temp

to cause catastrophic global climate changes.

The fact that scientists have been surprised SEVERAL TIMES recently is troublesome indeed. In the movie (which I assume was researched well), the scientists only noted small changes over a few month period.

We're in deep crap! And four more years of Shrub would be disastrous for universe. Help!!

[DrWeird]

15. The movie was pseudoscience bullshit.

That did more harm than good for public awarness.

[Horse with no Name]

18. Yeah

But has awesome special effects!
:silly:

[Selatius]

27. The theory actually exists, they just distorted it to make a movie

The theory though would predict changes over hundreds or thousands of years, not several weeks as in the movie The Day After Tomorrow. They compressed the timeframe to the point of absurdity.

The theory is simple: If you melt enough fresh water and dump it into the North Atlantic, you'll disrupt the northerly flow of warmer water from the tropics through temperature changes and salinity changes. It shuts down, and so the heat that keeps North America and Europe warm disappears. The area would more resemble Siberia instead. That's the theory in a nutshell.

I don't know if the theory can be applied to other parts of the world though (i.e. the Southern Hemisphere).

[Beam Me Up]

29. "changes over hundreds or thousands of years" -- no, much faster.

This theory of rapid climate change due to the desalination of the oceans was first published in Discover Magazine over ten years ago. I'm not sure how to locate the original article using goggle as I don't recall the climatologist who proposed it. He began articulating the theory as a result of drilling for and studying ice-core samples in Greenland from which he observed that the Earth has undergone extreme shifts in climate in the remote past.

It is true that the movie changed the scenario to severe climate change in just ONE WEEK (highly unlikely) where the original theory suggested YEARS --but not hundreds or thousands of years--perhaps as few as ten.

snippets from:
http://www.nrdc.org/media/pressreleases/040310.asp

Reporters recently uncovered an unclassified report ordered by the Defense Department to assess the geopolitical consequences of abrupt climate change impacts, including drought, famine and severe storms, along with drastic cooling in some regions (see the Environmental Media Services website). An over-the-top version of this scenario is the basis for The Day After Tomorrow, which depicts New York City frozen beneath a layer of glacial ice and tornados sweeping through Los Angeles.
...
The uncertain scenario in the controversial Pentagon paper is not without scientific basis. In fact, it draws expressly from a 2002 National Academy of Sciences report, which concluded, based on climate history, that increased carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping emissions could trigger rapid climate shifts of 10 degrees Fahrenheit over the span of just one or two decades.

[Dogmudgeon]

31. Fast temperature changes

They're well-established by studies in meteorology, oceanography, geology, and paleontology. The cold snaps are called Heinrich Events and the warm ones are called Dansgaard-Oeschger Events. A Google search should turn up hundreds of monographs and abstracts.

In addition, large temperature spikes are known to occur before major and minor "Ice Ages", and such spikes are much larger at the north pole. And this is exactly what we've been seeing in the Arctic in the last decade. (The South Pole, being an ice-covered continent, is more resistant to such changes).

I strongly suspect that we are heading into a cold period on the order of the Younger-Dryas episode of 10,000 years ago (perhaps even a new major glaciation, but no one really knows how they get started). The Wisconsonian/Würm ice age was over, and as the great Laurentide (Quebec) ice sheet was melting, a large freshwater lake on the ice broke through to the North Atlantic. The dilution of the seawater with the fresh icemelt water caused the Thermohaline Current to stop. This whole process took about 20 years, and our current episode of global warming is causing the process to be repeated with the ice sheets over Greenland and the Arctic Ocean.

The Younger-Dryas took about 1500 years to resolve.

None of this is "pseudoscientific bullshit", as it's sometimes called. The global climate is in the middle of a major transition and it's following the patterns suggested by 40 years of research. Even the scenario in The Day After Tomorrow is plausible -- not likely by any means, but there's enough energy behind the climate changes to support "superstorms" (sometimes called "Wave-2 Storms" in meteorology).

The climate-change pattern we would most likely see would be an intensification of warming for several years, but probably no more than half a century (according to Wallace Broecker at Columbia/Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory); and even more abrupt temperature drops, with years of no hurricanes or, more seriously, no Asian Monsoons. Winters would probably not resemble The Day After Tomorrow but they would be substantially longer, colder, and wetter (and snowier) than they are now. Winters in northern Canada would leave enough snow so that it wouldn't melt away in the summertime, and the ice would advance in the winter.

Using this as an excuse to keep warming the atmosphere would not be a good idea. It would cause more equatorial warming, oceanic evaporation, and re-condensation as polar snow and ice. We've only just started to understand that the process is complex and dynamic.

--p!

[XemaSab]

45. The southern hemispehere

has FAR less land than the northern hemisphere, so they have much milder climates... cooler in summer, warmer in winter.

[todwest]

42. Movie was bad, but not totally inaccurate.

Recent evidence shows that it is possible to have a major temperature shift in a very short time.

Here are several links which may help clarify this debate:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/abrupt/story.html

http://www.nap.edu/books/0309074347/html/

The film was obviously wrong about the timing and range of such a climate shift, but it is possible to have as much as a ten degree shift in just a few years. It has happened in the distant past as evidenced by geological records, mostly ice cores from the polar regions.

The fact is we really don't know enough about this stuff to make any concrete predictions as to how rapid this shift would be, but it could get pretty hairy. If the Gulf Stream were to shift to the south -- something which is entirely possible -- most of northern Europe would become like northern Canada within a very short time: virtually uninhabitable for a good portion of the year, in other words. England, for instance, could end up having huge problems with advancing glaciers.

Hollywood obviously takes a great deal of literary license when it comes to matters of science, but this doesn't mean there isn't a major problem.

[Old and In the Way]

5. It's rather simple.

If we are wrong with our assumptions, what's happened? We've done things to make the Earth a little better place to live for future generations...and maybe provided more jobs to industries that supply pollution control equipment.

If they, the naysayers, are wrong.....game over.

[evolvenow]

6. If you want any truth, observe the clues of Nature...and pay close attenti

on to the abuses of our humans...including the military and beyond.

Dolphin, whale deaths in large numbers, birds falling dead from the skies...

IMHO, I believe all of the electromagnetic and other anomalous activities under/in the oceans, Haarp, Gwen, Elf and oil industry, space weaponry, over consumption of oil and clearing of forests....glaciers melting....the worst, I can only image is classified and what is obvious is having synergistic effects.

We must stop living in such harnful ways, and utilize alternative energies and sustainable practices...regardless of the propaganda...we need to take care of each other, and the planet.

[zann725]

11. But that "consciousness" will NEVER happen with Shrubco in office.

Kerry would've cared. Gore would've too. Sigh...

[evolvenow]

25. Yes Zann!The irony is that with the escalation of damage to the planet

will force the world into creative solutions which will need to be sustainable, or we will be gone...
the earth will continue..
but we must integrate the FACT that we are a part of the world... not the center of the Universe.

Ooh yeah, they do not like that idea....gotta play nice with others.

kick

[nolabels]

37. My Bible says that Gawd gave us dominion over all we see............

My only question would be is if this thing, entity or persona had or has such great foresight why would it be allowing so few to screw it up for so many so quickly?

I still think that size of the petri dish we are living in and the woeful ignorance we display will lead to our ultimate demise

[dbt]

16. Well said, evolvenow!

Still, it bears pointing out that everything you mention in your post has been roundly mocked and ridiculed by a contingent of DUers over the last couple of years.

Every day, the so-called "tinfoil" is becoming Reality. BOO!

:evilgrin:
dbt

[evolvenow]

24. WE need to Shift, before it Hits the Fan!! I have been in favor of living

in a non-violent manner, since I was child, and have always encountered massive oppostion...so odd, as it is the only way of living that is sustainable, or makes any sense.

[Selatius]

28. It's already hit the fan.

The planet's ecosystem is like a gigantic freight car. If you apply sufficient force, it will move, but there's usually a lag between the time you apply the force to the time it begins moving. When it moves though, it takes a while to stop even if you instantly stop pushing. It's going to continue moving down the wrong track for a little bit before eventually correcting. That's our fault.

A good amount of damage has already been done. It's just now manifesting itself.

[evolvenow]

46. Absolutely right Sel. Even more urgent to reverse, and heal, and we know t

that that is not likely for some time. Bear 2 ideas.....1, Nature has incredible adaptive qualities, so it will most likely be MAN that will become endangered, 2. If MAN, stops acting like a rapist , stops devasting the entire planet, so people can drive SUV's, stops the fighting of illegal wars, and stops using technology to destroy....
Then, the great minds and hearts on this planet will UNDERSTAND that we must act co-creatively, without harm. When the Neo Cons are locked up in the Hague, many, many futuristic technologies will be revealed that are capable of reversing even radioactivity...of course, no one will know about these cool,life supporting technolgies while the few war criminals are in charge.

[Pachamama]

20. You mean the "Butterfly effect"?

That is what it is....we are all interconnected...

[evolvenow]

23. Exactly, and where we continue to poison will reflect 1000 fold, until we

shift to that core understanding. It has been documented that when there is war anywhere on the planet, people have dreams/nightmares about the details. Morphic resonance , IMHO, is quickening, so the ability to move from thought to manifesting is more rapid...meaning, we are finding out about harm, secrets, more rapidly.

[Pachamama]

41. Yep...our planet is in crisis...and its happening across the board

environmentally, peoples health & spiritual well-being, the survival of species and the planet as a whole...

In 1997 while I was deep in the Amazon meeting with various tribes such as the Huaharani, Achuar, Shuar and Uwa tribes, they all told me to beware the people in the North who want Pachamama's blood (Pachamama is the Quechua name for Mother Earth, thus my DU Name)will start great Wars. Pachamama's Blood is Oil...Many of the tribes believe it its Mother Earths pulse and the Uwa are even willing to die for it (they threatened mass suicide if the Colombian Govt permitted oil drilling on their tribal land).

A very wise Shaman of the Huaharani tribe, Mengahue (sp?) said to me that its not about the destruction of Pachamama as many people assume, its about the destruction of humanity. He said that Pachamama was here long before humans and she will be here long after. But if she continues to be abused and used as she is and not properly cared for, she will shake us humans off like a dog shaking off fleas....

[drummer55]

7. pbs has a good show out on warming/cooling oceans

http://www.pbs.org/saf/

[maxsolomon]

8. tra la la nothing to see move along

you economy hating green nazis.

[Wilms]

9. Hey!! I'm not a economy hating green nazi.

I'm a tree-hugging luddite. OK, bub?

[ausiedownunderground]

12. As fresh water ice melts the ocean becomes less Saline!!!

Tree hugging Luddites are the same thing as Economy hating green nazis -I read it in the latest Oz version of the Theaursaurus!

[Coconut Buddha Ape]

13. Cue ignorant right wing knee-jerk response:

"Oceans getting cooler? Looks like global warming is just a fairy tale after all!"

Why the fuck is it so hard for these chasing-the-bottom-dollar assholes to understand that shitting where you live is a bad idea? Like pigs, these guys are determined to wallow in their own filth. Or maybe I just insulted pigs.

[evolvenow]

26. Yep, Pigs are very intelligent, it is just people forcing them to live in

filth....awful, awful industry.

[tavalon]

36. Yes, actually you did

They wouldn't behave like that if we didn't put them in ghetto, overcrowded situations.

[DrWeird]

14. That'll decrease carbonic acid solubility.

i.e. more CO2 in the atmosphere.

Everything's shaping up to be a lot worse than the best case scenario.

[Psephos]

49. Exactly the opposite is true - cooler oceans will increase CO2 solubility

Carbon dioxide solubility decreases as water temperature rises, and increases as water temperature drops. So does oxygen solubility, too, or any other gas you care to name. That's because as the dissolved gas molecules grow warmer, they bounce around faster and faster, and escape from the surface as a vapor. Ever taste boiled water? It tastes flat, because all the oxygen has been driven out of it. Or try this: open a cold bottle of soda, and it will hiss a little. Open a warm bottle, and it very likely will rush up and spill out the top. Same idea.

So, bottom line is that cooler oceans will drain more CO2 from the atmosphere. That's good.

[hvn_nbr_2]

17. I've read about a similar cold water flow in the north Atlantic

coming from melting north pole ice. The fear is that it could disrupt the gulf stream, which would be a major catastrophe for western Europe. Paris is further north than Quebec and Berlin is north from Winnipeg, but the gulf stream gives Europe a temperate climate. If we (USA government) don't wise up, some day the rest of the world will just pull the plug on our economy to stop us. If they all get together, they can literally crash the U.S. economy in 24 hours; heck, China alone could probably do it.

[Old Mouse]

19. You got that right

first they're going to try to overpower our economy, and if that doesn't slow our emissions, well it's the survival of the planet versus the United States. What choice will they have?

[MHalblaub]

21. That's what's going on there at the moment:

Always dreamed of skiing in the Alps? Better do it quick. Rising global temperatures are bringing shorter winters to Europe and increasing difficulties for its famous ski resorts. Many resorts are already suffering and some winter-sport regions are already beginning to plan for a life, aprés ski.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x107065

[Coexist]

30. Yes, there is a conveyor belt effect as the water

that is warmer sinks and returns from up past Great Britain back to south of Florida.

There is evidence that in the past, this conveyor was shut down due to the change in salinity. It meant some pretty cold winters up in northern Europe.

One way to compare it is to look at the weather and mean temperatures on the western coast of Britain and compare them to the temperatures in areas of the world that are on the same latitude.

[BreweryYardRat]

22. God dammit!

These incompetent, greedy, conservative assholes are destroying our planet. Global warming, pollution, the rape of the last wild places. Even as the rest of the world wakes up, the so-called "leadership" here in the U.S. is still peacefully asleep, dreaming of where they can put new factories and oil rigs. I'm ashamed to be a U.S. citizen.

[TO Kid]

32. So is it global warming or the new ice age again?

I wonder what the next "proof" that us eeeevil humans are destroying the planet will reveal.

[hvn_nbr_2]

39. Simplistic thinking

Simplistic (or is it simpleton) thinking expects global warming should mean that everywhere warms equally as much at exactly the same time. The basic observation that ice melts and liquid water moves should clue you that it isn't that simple. That's why climate modeling uses big computers instead of a Javascript at the internet cafe.

[DU GrovelBot]

33. ## PLEASE DONATE TO DEMOCRATIC UNDERGROUND! ##

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[Occulus]

34. I suppose GrovelBot will tell us next:

ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!

[hvn_nbr_2]

38. I think I saw one that said that!

Actually, I think it said "all your (something else but I forget what) are belong to us." I think they're kind of fun. I even triggered it in one thread. I posted #32 and it came in at #33.

[nashville_brook]

35. surfers in central florida have been saying this for years

friends in brevard county florida -- Cocoa Beach area -- have been saying for years that the water has been staying cold way into the summer months, which has never been the case.

[Massachusetts]

43. MOST of us are contributing to the Global climate change,

in one way or another.

Mother Earth WILL PREVAIL....Humans WILL NOT.

[Massachusetts]

44. MOST of us are contributing to the Global climate change,

in one way or another.

Mother Earth WILL PREVAIL....Humans WILL NOT.

[evolvenow]

47. Nature is much more intelligent than humans...kick