Climate disaster: The temperature of the oceans is at a record high

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Climate disaster: The temperature of the oceans is at a record high

This leads to more severe storms and disruption of the water cycle - more floods, droughts and forest fires

 

 

 

Oceans reached a new record high in 2019, showing the planet's "irrefutable and accelerating" warming, writes The Guardian.

The oceans of the world are the clearest measure of a climate emergency as they absorb more than 90% of the heat captured by greenhouse gases emitted from fossil fuels, forest destruction and other human activities.

The new analysis shows that the last five years are the first five warmest years recorded in the ocean, and the last 10 years are the first 10 warmest. The amount of heat added to the oceans is equivalent to every person on the planet operating 100 microwaves a day.

Hot oceans cause more storms and disrupt the water cycle, which means more floods, droughts and forest fires, as well as relentless sea level rise. Higher temperatures are also detrimental to life in the seas, with sea waves rising sharply.

The most common measure for global heating is the average surface air temperature, as people live here. But natural climatic events like the El Nino events mean that this can be quite different from year to year.

"The oceans are really what shows you how fast the Earth is warming up," says Prof. John Abraham of St. Thomas University in Minnesota, USA, and one of the team behind the new analysis. "Using the oceans, we see a steady, steady and accelerating rate of warming on planet Earth. This is terrible news," he added.

"We found that 2019 was not only the warmest year, it showed the largest one-year increase in a decade, sobering a reminder that human-caused planet heating continues to accelerate," says Professor Michael Mann of the University Pennsylvania, USA, and another team member.

The analysis, published in the journal Advances In Atmospheric Sciences, uses ocean data from every available source. Most data are from 3800 free-floating buoys scattered across the oceans, but also from torpedo-shaped bathytermographs released by ships in the past.

The results show that heat increases with increasing velocity as greenhouse gases build up in the atmosphere. The speed from 1987 to 2019 is four and a half faster than that from 1955 to 1986. Most of the ocean regions show an increase in heat.

That energy leads to more storms and more extreme weather, Abraham says.

"When the world and the oceans heat up, it changes the way it rains and evaporates. There is a general rule that drier areas will become drier and wetter areas will become wetter and rainfall will become more torrential. "

The hotter oceans are also expanding and melting the ice, causing sea levels to rise. The last 10 years have also shown the highest sea level since 1900. Scientists expect about one meter rise in sea level by the end of the century, enough to displace 150 million people worldwide.

Dan Smile, of the UK Marine Biological Association, who is not part of the team, said the methods used are state-of-the-art and the data is the best.

"For me, the message is that the heat content of the upper layers of the global ocean, especially up to 300 meters deep, is rapidly increasing and will continue to increase as the oceans draw in more heat from the atmosphere," he said. Focus ".

"The upper layers of the ocean are vital to marine biodiversity as they support some of the most productive and abundant ecosystems on Earth, and drama of this magnitude will affect drama.