Oceans absorb less carbon dioxide
The world’s oceans currently absorb around a quarter of all CO2 produced, so a significant decrease could lead to dangerous temperature rises.
Kitack Lee of Pohang University of Science and Technology in South Korea led a team who tracked CO2 uptake in the Sea of Japan over a 15-year period. They found that the amount of dissolved CO2 in the water between 1999 and 2007 was half that recorded between 1992 and 1999.
‘Our result in the East Sea [as South Korea calls the Sea of Japan] unequivocally demonstrated that oceanic uptake of CO2 has been directly affected by warming-induced weakening of vertical ventilation [the mixing process that pulls absorbed CO2 into deeper water],’ Lee told the Guardian.
‘This previously undocumented finding may be an indicator of future changes in the global ocean during the coming period of global warming,’ the scientists wrote in their report.
March 2009
Kitack Lee of Pohang University of Science and Technology in South Korea led a team who tracked CO2 uptake in the Sea of Japan over a 15-year period. They found that the amount of dissolved CO2 in the water between 1999 and 2007 was half that recorded between 1992 and 1999.
‘Our result in the East Sea [as South Korea calls the Sea of Japan] unequivocally demonstrated that oceanic uptake of CO2 has been directly affected by warming-induced weakening of vertical ventilation [the mixing process that pulls absorbed CO2 into deeper water],’ Lee told the Guardian.
‘This previously undocumented finding may be an indicator of future changes in the global ocean during the coming period of global warming,’ the scientists wrote in their report.
March 2009
|
FIND OUT WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT ON TWITTER:
|
