State of the

Oceans & Climate

Climate
- Heat sink & carbon sink
- Absorb heat and carbon dioxide [caused by climate change]
- Climate regulation
- Transportation of heat from equator to poles; cold water from poles to tropics
- ‘Conveyer belt’
- Currents in ocean stabilises regional temperature, making land habitable
- Concerns:
- Heat absorption too much: affect biodiversity
- CO2 absorption too much → ocean acidification → threaten healths of
marine ecosystems
Biodiversity

- Mangroves → grown in coastal areas with roots in seawater

- Reduce impact of seawater by bringing down water levels and inflow
speed
- Protection
- Concerns:
- Warmer ocean:
- Algae fails to carry out photosynthesis; and can die
- Coral lose food source → turn weak/die
- Coral bleaching
- Unsuitable environment for some fishes
Salt in oceans
- Salinity reflects net exchange of freshwater between oceans and the
atmosphere
- Evaporation: increase salinity; precipitation: decrease salinity
- water sinks due to higher salinity (density), vice versa
- This leads to ocean currents → part of the water cycle

- Salinity change → water cycle changes

- i.e. salinity helps predict climate change
- Concern:
- If too much ice melts, the salinity will decrease, which affects ocean currents
El Nino & La Nina
- Recurring climate patterns: warm and cool phases across the Pacific Ocean
- Natural & irregular occurrence
- El Nino:
- warming of the central & eastern tropical Pacific (e.g. Southern US)
- Wind weaken, or blows from west to east (instead of east to west, the normal
situation)
- La Nina:
- Reverse of El Nino: Sustained cooling of central & eastern tropical Pacific
- Above-average precipitation across the Pacific Northwest's southern and
eastern regions
Flooding in Pakistan
- Normally in Pakistan, there are only 3 - 4 cycles of rain
- But is going through its eighth cycle of monsoon

- Causes:
- Seawater warms → top layer release heat to ocean, lower layers hold onto
heat → thermal expansion → saltwater incursion (movement of saltwater to
freshwater)
- → sea level rise → more floods and rain