GRL - Study Reveals "Collapse" In Carbon Uptake By Sea Of Japan - Guardian

[hatrack]

Sea absorbing less CO2, scientists discoverDavid Adam, environment correspondent The Guardian, Monday 12 January 2009 Article historyScientists have issued a new warning about climate change after discovering a sudden and dramatic collapse in the amount of carbon emissions absorbed by the Sea of Japan. The shift has alarmed experts, who blame global warming.

The world's oceans soak up about 11bn tonnes of human carbon dioxide pollution each year, about a quarter of all produced, and even a slight weakening of this natural process would leave significantly more CO2 in the atmosphere. That would require countries to adopt much stricter emissions targets to prevent dangerous rises in temperature.

Kitack Lee, an associate professor at Pohang University of Science and Technology, who led the research, says the discovery is the "very first observation that directly relates ocean CO2 uptake change to ocean warming". He says the warmer conditions disrupt a process known as "ventilation" - the way seawater flows and mixes and drags absorbed CO2 from surface waters to the depths. He warns that the effect is probably not confined to the Sea of Japan. It could also affect CO2 uptake in the Atlantic and Southern oceans.

"Our result in the East Sea unequivocally demonstrated that oceanic uptake of CO2 has been directly affected by warming-induced weakening of vertical ventilation," he says. Korea argues that the Sea of Japan should be renamed the East Sea, because it says the former is a legacy of Japan's military expansion in the region. Lee adds: "In other words, the increase in atmospheric temperature due to global warming can profoundly influence the ocean ventilation, thereby decreasing the uptake rate of CO2."

EDIT

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jan/12/sea-co2-climate-japan-environment

[lurky]

1. Super. Well, at least we have a PE who acknowledges we have a problem.

Let's hope he has the courage to take dramatic action. While the economic crisis is important, even the worst depressions turn around eventually, even if it takes a decade or two. If we don't head off a climate crisis, however, were all cooked for good.

[RaleighNCDUer]

2. Nobody could have anticipated yet another previously unknown

warming feedback loop.

I've said it before, and will again - the REAL rate of warming can be anticipated by taking the scientists' worst case scenarios and tripling them.

The arctic will be summer ice free by no later than 2015. The Greenland ice sheet will disappear by 2050. We will see world wide sea level rise of at least 15' by 2050.