Climate Change - The Gulf Stream - Well worth the read

THank you Mim. Haven´t seen that article even though I follow the climate changes reported by BBC.

The UK newspapers have done a great work the past few years to report such things - even though Blair doesn´t want them to...

OOooohhh... and this is also an interesting article about Artic and the changes...


Changes in the Arctic: Consequences for the World
[link to www.spacedaily.com]

Directly related to the conveyr belt is this quote from the article:

"Records show that the fresh water in Siberia´s three largest rivers has swelled by roughly a quarter of the annual flow of the Mississippi River, and that water is now being poured directly into the Arctic Ocean.
The global ocean circulation is regulated by cold, dense water that sinks in the Arctic. This water moves south toward the equator and well below the surface in the Atlantic. Upon its circular return northward, it pulls warm tropical water north along the surface, where, like a hot-water heater, it releases heat back into the atmosphere.
An influx of fresh water to the Arctic Ocean could prevent the water there from sinking and essentially halt this conveyor-belt-like flow. Changes in ocean currents can greatly complicate overall climate change and, among other things, leave some regions, like England and eastern Canada, much cooler than they otherwise would be. "


TNW

Thank´s northwind that was cool.

Have you managed to come by any info pertaining to the affects of how a Tsunami like the recent one would affect the flow of ocean currents throught the region, and if the region would disrupt other system for a period of time.

Also adding to this recent event we have a minute disruption of Earths central axis which I read last week also may be an indicator to the beginning of abrupt climatic changes.

Speculating here that this could be a sudden componded hidden factor that has just recently occured that may increase the rate of climatic change.

I guess it will take time to find these things out though I´m sure someone can come up with an answer in time.

Read this about the wobble affect.
-----------------------------
Hot and cold: Northern hemisphere swung through temperature extremes
AFP: 2/9/2005

PARIS, Feb 9 (AFP) - The northern hemisphere experienced a prolonged heatwave a thousand years ago but was plunged into a chill some 500 years later, according to research that throws light on a key aspect of global warming.

The big climate shifts occurred before industrialisation and so have natural causes. Even so, they could play a mighty role in man-made global warming by amplifying or easing the peril, the study says.

The northern part of the planet experienced two warm peaks at around the year 1000 to 1100, it says. Then, in the 16th and 17th centuries, there was a significant cooling.

Overall, the temperature swing between these two events was in the region of 0.65-0.9 C (1.17-1.62 F), which is huge in terms of the potential impact on the climate, according to the study, led by meteorologist Anders Moberg at Stockholm University in Sweden.

Previous evidence has already suggested Earth´s climate suddenly warmed and abruptly cooled at these times. But the best bet was a far smaller temperature range of 0.5 C (0.9 F).

The suspected causes for such natural climate shifts are tiny fluctuations in the planet´s orbit, as well as "wobbles" in the spin of its axis. Minute changes such as this can greatly change the exposure of part of the world to heat from the Sun.

Another potential source of climate change are large volcanic eruptions, which disgorge carbon dioxide (CO2) -- the "greenhouse" gas which traps solar heat and forces up the surface temperature.

The new research is important because it shows how natural events have the ability either to worsen man-made global warming or alternatively to brake it.

But so far, no one can predict when the next big climate swing will occur and whether it will make things hotter or colder.

Already, Earth´s surface temperature has warmed by 0.7-0.8 C (1.26-1.44 F) since 1900, and the 1990s was the hottest decade on record.

If fossil-fuel greenhouse gases -- released by burning oil, gas and coal -- are allowed to grow unchecked, the stage could be set for dramatic climate change just a few decades from now, scientists say.

Moberg´s study, which appears on Thursday in the weekly British science journal Nature, took a new approach to reconstructing climate change.

It applied a new mathematical model, called wavelet analysis, to evidence gained from sedimentary cores, stalagmites and tree rings.

In sedimentary cores, levels of preserved pollen, shells and algae called diatoms give indicators as to the temperatures that prevailed at that point in history.

Like stalagmites -- which grow faster when it is warming -- cores give evidence over centuries about climate change.

However, this data is broad, and lacks fine resolution about climate change on a scale of decades.

For that, tree ring evidence is useful. These rings show fast trees grew in response to higher or lower levels of CO2, a gas needed for photosynthesis.

In another climate study, likewise published in Nature, US and Canadian scientists cast doubt on hopes that plants can adapt quickly if, as is gloomily expected, CO2 levels surge this century.

They studied colonies of a fungus over six years, exposing different groups to varying levels of CO2. Fungus communities that were exposed to quickly rising levels of CO2 were the worst affected -- they were thinner and less rich in species diversity.

02/09/2005 19:00 GMT - AFP
AFP
Copyright © 2004 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AFP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Agence France Presse.

Mim,
Don´t know the effects but here´s a link to how the ocean floor changed during the large earthquake in the Indian ocean.

[link to www.newscientist.com]

uk is going to have winters as cool as siberia
minus 40 - if the gulf stream cannot warm the arctic air in winter

Mim,
I don´t know either if the tsunami could change the ocean current in any way - other than at a local basis. But it was an interesting thought though.


This article is about the Palk Strait-canal project and the impact of the tsunami:

[link to www.hindustantimes.com]
"A senior professor at the University of Moratuwa, he said that it was possible that the flow of ocean currents had changed in the Palk Strait as a result of the tsunami, because the immediate neighboured had gone into a convulsion.



---Also adding to this recent event we have a minute disruption of Earths central axis which I read last week also may be an indicator to the beginning of abrupt climatic changes.---

I´m a bit confused here - did you mean the xtra-wobbling that the great earthquake made in December? Or have you heard about any other wobbling effects except for the usual Chandler wobble?

From an article that I’ve saved, there is a connection between the tilt of the Earth’s orbit – and ice ages:

[link to www.lbl.gov]

Quote:
“Muller and MacDonald report that cyclical changes in the location of the Earth´s orbit cause differing quantities of extraterrestrial debris to come into the Earth´s atmosphere. This, in turn, results in variations of climate on the planet.”

TNW

I´m a bit confused here

---

Yep I am talking about the recent wobble on 26th Dec 2004.

“Muller and MacDonald report that cyclical changes in the location of the Earth´s orbit cause differing quantities of extraterrestrial debris to come into the Earth´s atmosphere. This, in turn, results in variations of climate on the planet.”

---

Wow, it seems more we look at the climate model the further we see all the discrete interconnections with nature From background radiation and supernovas right down to the plankton on the bottom of our ocean.

From axis spin of the earth, types of energy hitting the atmosphere, the cycle of the Sun, Moon, Tides, ICE, Temperature, thermal currents, volcanic activity and whom knows perhaps the position of the maggnetic pole may also play a roll in the climate model along with many other yet undiscovered co-relations.

Its almost as intereting and expansive as studying the goings on in space or the world of microbioly.

The internet is the best tool imaginable to learn aout all these things and I have to say all though many here bag the likes of NASA, JPL (including me from time o time) etc..

Thanks to these organizations for making unfortold amounts of information availabe to the general public that was previously inaccessable or unthought of prior to the advent of the internet.

Lets hope they continue to make more and more info available to everyone so we can increase our collective knowledge.

On a ramble today - Cheers :)