[Coral-List] CO2 and tropical waters.

[Tom Williams]

Listers

John's email presumes that the CO2 concentrations are constant worldwide...although AtmCO2 losses to OceCO2 in the Aluetian and North Atlantic and circumAntarctica may be higher than those in the tropics.

Interestingly the colder polar waters are getting warmer and especially in the Arctic the transfers may be reducing and thereby maintaining a higher AtmCO2 than may be expected from model. If the oceanic circulation between the Antarctic circumpolar currents decrease due to reducing Olar/Tropic differentials, polar transfers of Atm>OceCO2 may further change the balances as the OCeCO2 may reach saturation more quickly as the water is not descending and drawing in other less saturated waters.

Pre-"Global Warming" Atm/OceCO2 concentration were or have been influenced by the surface ocean, descending (downwelling), and upwelling currents and few models that I have heard of reflect the "sluggish" ocean circulation in horizontal and vertical regimes.

Losses of Arctic pack ice and Antarctic shelf ice will contribute to an even greater variation in current and winds, and temperatures related to albedos which appear to further confuse and confound US.

During Plocene (3-9MY) climates appeared to be more randomized, and present day strongly seasonal climates and stronger ocean currents appear to be retrograding to the Pliocene conditions. They can't get back to those conditions due to existing mountain ranges but climates and current may become more randomized and more weakly defined than in the recent past.
    
Tom Williams  




--- On Wed, 2/11/09, John Ware <jware at erols.com> wrote:

> From: John Ware <jware at erols.com>
> Subject: [Coral-List] CO2 and tropical waters.
> To: "coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov" <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>
> Date: Wednesday, February 11, 2009, 11:43 AM
> Dear List,
> 
> I agree with much of what Thomas Goreau has written (see
> below), but I 
> do not agree about his implication that tropical surface
> waters can 
> continue to be a source of CO2 as BOTH temperature and pCO2
> increase.
> 
> Surely logic would lead one to conclude that, at the very
> least, CO2 
> emissions from warm tropical surface waters must decrease
> at atmospheric 
> partial pressure of CO2 increases.
> 
> To put the argument in concrete terms, suppose, just for
> the sake of 
> discussion, that the warm surface waters were in
> equilibrium for 
> atmospheric CO2 for CO2 at 275 ppmv, salinity 33 ppt,
> temperature 30 oC. 
> My computer program indicates that dissolved inorganic
> carbon (DIC) is 
> about 2.75 mM/L at a pH of 8.449.  (Your computer program
> will probably 
> give different answers because we use different constants
> or slightly 
> different computational methods.  However, what counts is
> not absolute 
> values, but differences.)
> 
> Now, suppose nothing else happens but that pCO2 doubles to
> 550 ppmv. DIC 
> increases by 23% to 3.37 mM/L and pH decreases by about 0.2
> units to 8.27. 
> 
> Of course, global warming would increase water temperature
> and the 
> solubility of  CO2 would decrease.  So, by how much would
> temperature 
> have to increase to offset the increase in DIC due to
> increased pCO2? 
> The answer is over 10 Co to approximately 40 oC!!  (In
> fact, my program, 
> which could be wrong, indicates a temperature increase to
> 45 oC.)
> 
> And, of at least equal importance, the pH stays almost the
> same as the 
> temperature increases, so the acidification due to
> increased pCO2 is NOT 
> affected by the increase in temperature.
> 
> Now, a lot of assumptions go into this type of
> calculations, and I would 
> appreciate my conclusions being confirmed or rejected if
> they are wrong. 
> However, the confirmation or rejection should be based upon
> 
> calculations, not hand waving arguments.
> 
> John
> 
> P.S. On slightly different, but related, topic.  The recent
> paper by 
> Solomon et al (PNAS, 2009, 106:1704-1709) shows that, even
> if 
> anthropogenic CO2 emissions were to magically go to zero
> instantly, the 
> effects continue for at least 1000 yrs.
> 
> J
> 
> -- 
>    
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