From the University of Toronto , something quite unexpected.
Scientists connect seawater chemistry with climate change and evolution
TORONTO, ON – Humans get most of the blame for climate change, with little attention paid to the contribution of other natural forces. Now, scientists from the University of Toronto and the University of California Santa Cruz are shedding light on one potential cause of the cooling trend of the past 45 million years that has everything to do with the chemistry of the world’s oceans.
“Seawater chemistry is characterized by long phases of stability, which are interrupted by short intervals of rapid change,” says Professor Ulrich Wortmann in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Toronto, lead author of a study to be published in Science this week. “We’ve established a new framework that helps us better interpret evolutionary trends and climate change over long periods of time. The study focuses on the past 130 million years, but similar interactions have likely occurred through the past 500 million years.”
Wortmann and co-author Adina Paytan of the Institute of Marine Sciences at the University of California Santa Cruz point to the collision between India and Eurasia approximately 50 million years ago as one example of an interval of rapid change. This collision enhanced dissolution of the most extensive belt of water-soluble gypsum on Earth, stretching from Oman to Pakistan, and well into Western India – remnants of which are well exposed in the Zagros mountains.
The authors suggest that the dissolution or creation of such massive gyspum deposits will change the sulfate content of the ocean, and that this will affect the amount of sulfate aerosols in the atmosphere and thus climate. “We propose that times of high sulfate concentrations in ocean water correlate with global cooling, just as times of low concentration correspond with greenhouse periods,” says Paytan.
“When India and Eurasia collided, it caused dissolution of ancient salt deposits which resulted in drastic changes in seawater chemistry,” Paytan continues. “This may have led to the demise of the Eocene epoch – the warmest period of the modern-day Cenozoic era – and the transition from a greenhouse to icehouse climate, culminating in the beginning of the rapid expansion of the Antarctic ice sheet.”
The researchers combined data of past seawater sulfur composition, assembled by Paytan in 2004, with Wortmann’s recent discovery of the strong link between marine sulfate concentrations and carbon and phosphorus cycling. They were able to explain the seawater sulfate isotope record as a result of massive changes to the accumulation and weathering of gyspum – the mineral form of hydrated calcium sulfate.
“While it has been known for a long time that gyspum deposits can be formed and destroyed rapidly, the effect of these processes on seawater chemistry has been overlooked,” says Wortmann. “The idea represents a paradigm shift in our understanding of how ocean chemistry changes over time and how these changes are linked to climate.”
The findings are reported in the paper “Rapid Variability of Seawater Chemistry over the Past 130 Million Years.” The research is supported by a Discovery Grant to Wortmann from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and a National Science Foundation CAREER award to Paytan. Data used in the research was collected through the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) and facilitated by the United States Implementing Organization (USIO) and the Canadian Consortium for Ocean Drilling (CCOD).
About the IODP & the CCOD
The Integrated Ocean DrillingProgram (IODP) is an international research program dedicated to advancing scientific understanding of the Earth through drilling, coring, and monitoring the subseafloor. The JOIDES Resolution is a scientific research vessel managed by the U.S. Implementing Organization of IODP (USIO). Texas A&M University, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University and the Consortium for Ocean Leadership together comprise the USIO. IODP is supported by two lead agencies: the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology. Additional program support comes from the European Consortium for Ocean Research Drilling (ECORD), the Australia-New Zealand IODP Consortium (ANZIC), India’s Ministry of Earth Sciences, the People’s Republic of China (Ministry of Science and Technology), and the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources. For more information, visit www.iodp.org.
The Canadian Consortium for Ocean Drilling (CCOD) is a consortium composed of Canadian universities formed to facilitate, support and encourage Canada’s participation in IODP.
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Vol. 337 no. 6092 pp. 334-336
Rapid Variability of Seawater Chemistry Over the Past 130 Million Years
Ulrich G. Wortmann ,Adina Paytan
Abstract
Fluid inclusion data suggest that the composition of major elements in seawater changes slowly over geological time scales. This view contrasts with high-resolution isotope data that imply more rapid fluctuations of seawater chemistry. We used a non–steady-state box model of the global sulfur cycle to show that the global δ34S record can be explained by variable marine sulfate concentrations triggered by basin-scale evaporite precipitation and dissolution. The record is characterized by long phases of stasis, punctuated by short intervals of rapid change. Sulfate concentrations affect several important biological processes, including carbonate mineralogy, microbially mediated organic matter remineralization, sedimentary phosphorous regeneration, nitrogen fixation, and sulfate aerosol formation. These changes are likely to affect ocean productivity, the global carbon cycle, and climate.
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Reblogged this on evilincandescentbulb and commented:
Paradigm shift: it is now just as accurate to say Allah may have caused global warming as to blame in on SUV-driving Americans.
Hmm. Lets see how it stands up to the big numbers test. Gypsum dihydrate and anhydrite have a solubility in distilled water of 2g/litre (sulphate part~1.5g/litre (fairly low). Seawater (todays) contains about 8gs/litre already of sulphate ions (equivalent to about 11gs/l of gypsum). The main sulphate minerals that one gets from seawater are Ca sulphate (anhydrite) and magnesium sulphate and the latter is the most abundant (~3 times [lazy to calculate]). Seawater also contains 3.5% total salts with about 85% being common salt.
I’m somewhat sceptical of how rapid “gysum” is going to dissolve in this water. However, let’s say it could be dissolved rapidly relative to geological time scales (that isn’t what they are saying, though). Let’s see how much gypsum can be dissolved in a volume of distilled water equal to the sea’s volume at 2.1gs/l: ~ 10^16 tonnes of gypsum. Known gypsum reserves are about 100B tonnes. The larger view: global gypsum resources have been estimated at ‘several trillion tonnes. Let’s say 10 trillion: 10^13 tonnes; maybe they are ten times this much say 10^14 tonnes. Now lets say we dissolved it all: we would raise the ocean content of gypsum by 0.02g/l (1% of the 2.1g/l) so the gypsum content of the ocean would go up from ~ 11g/litre to 11.02g/l. The sulphate aerosols would similarly go up by about 0.2%. Probably the gypsum deposits that are possible to have been available for dissolution during the collision would be only a few percent of what I calculated, i.e. no change at all. I trust my calcs are not outrageously off.
Jeff L says:
July 21, 2012 at 1:03 pm
I hope this explanation helps tie the images to what the author’s are thing to propose for non-geoscientists.
A wonderful explanation. I suspected that was the case, but was unsure. Thanks for your clearly written post.
Oops, I think it should be about 2g/l sulphate ions, not 8gs in natural seawater (3gs/l “gypsum). Dissolution would result ~ an increse of 1% in aerosols if all the global gypsum was dissolved. Since the available gypsum for dissolution during this event is only a few percent. There STILL is no significant change – Big Numbers are pretty forgiving.
Gary Pearse
July 21, 2012 at 4:01 pm
###
I think that the mechanism being suggested involves rain water and not sea water. Of course the Press Release and Abstract are pretty useless, like always. Regardless, I am still skeptical. The Himalayan orogeny (plus that little incident of Eurasia being rear ended by Africa, closing off the Tethys, etc). probably had more of an impact on climate.
Reply to ArndB
So if its not butterflies flapping their wings causing hurricanes then it is jellyfish swimming causing tidal waves. Well, we have air and sea covered. As for land how about earthworms causing earthquakes?
I have not read the entire thread yet so apologies if i am not the first to make this obvious joke.
Eugene WR Gallun
Jeff L says
The significance of this, which isn’t explicitly stated in the article, is that these folds are cored by evaporite minerals, such as gypsum, anhydrite & halite.
———–
thanks for explaining that. I was wondering what they meant exactly by dissolution.
This seems to relate to the hypothesis that the ice ages are induced by mountain building, erosion, calcium injection into the oceans and subsequent CO2 draw down leading to reduced green house effect and hence cooling.
The contradiction might be evidence of no change in sea water concentration of CO2.
And likely mountain building episodes prior to the ice ages.
@ur momisugly Eugene WR Gallun July 21, 2012 at 7:09 pm
The jelly fish thesis in the Nature article is not as stupid as you seem to suggest. The dumbness of the article (*) is to consider it as a possibility, not able to see that shipping, and other ocean uses (e.g. fishing, offshore wind farms) have a many fold higher potential as the jelly fish community with regard to ‘water mixing’. Oceans make climate! Discussed here: http://www.seaclimate.com/.
(*)Kwok, Roberta (2009); “Jellyfish help mix the world’s oceans”, Nature, online 29 July doi:10.1038/news.2009.745; http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090729/full/news.2009.745.htm
Regards AB
Ocean chemical composition has, it is assumed, been the same for the past 500Ma. Halite and gypsum is continuously falling out of solution in every warm sea and ocean. The Red Sea has some 900m of this mix at the bottom (identified by seismic surveys) . Rainwater dissolves various chemicals, including halite and gypsum, during it travels through bedrock and route to the sea. It does not taste but chemically identified in samples using a spectrograph. So perhaps this research includes much speculation and modelling.
So as the globe cools, more water is locked up as ice, and sea level drops, leaving gypsum deposits high and dry. If something causes the globe to warm, sea level rises inundating the gypsum which desolves into the ocean leading to global cooling. Neat little negative feedback just as you would expect.
So some major chemical change to the ocean caused a major change in climate. It was a geological change, so it was glacially slow.
But if we change atmospheric composition rather rapidly, it won’t be a problem?
I’m not sure how you get any comfort from this article.
Interesting, but I’m not yet convinced – we already have an explanation for the cooling of Antarctica: The opening of the Drake Passage.
Yesterday I had an epitome. I was readung an artical explaining how the gulf stream has slowed to a crawl or maybe even stopped, due to the hgh content of fresh water in the ocean. Then it hit me, the common sense approach. In the ocean the thinnest crust on the world to the magma area is there. If the plannet is destabilizing due to our magnetic field getting so weak (I think it has past the point where we are now seeing the effects of it) this is where we would have eruptions from volcanos first. These eruptions would heat up the ocean and in turn produce more aerosols in our atmosphere. Because our atmosphere has shrunk so much due to the effects from a weaker sun, it in turn inhances the process. The trigger to the next ice age is here. One big volcano or a number of regular eruptions and we are on the path to brrrrrrrrrrrr. On the map it showed warmer than normal water in the artic area beneath and around greenland where they have recently found a great many underwater volcanos. Wow, common sense approach, look at the ocean temperatures. It is obvious what is happenning. This article ties it all together!
Jeff L says:
July 21, 2012 at 1:03 pm
The correlation between the Indian plate collision with Asia & the subsequent downward trend in global temps has long been known by geologists but this is the first time I have heard this sulfate hypothesis proposed. Previously, the correlation was generally attributed to changes in upper atmosphere circulation, driven by the lifting of the mountains, both in Asia and in North America (Rocky Mtns uplift at roughly the same time).
I can see the potential validity in this hypothesis, although I wouldn’t say that it rules out the old hypothesis either. In reality, it could be a combination of both effects.
For non-geoscientists out there, the images of the Zagros foldbelt attached with the post , show compressional anticlines, which where formed by the collision of the Indian plate with Asia. The significance of this, which isn’t explicitly stated in the article, is that these folds are cored by evaporite minerals, such as gypsum, anhydrite & halite. The collision process forms the folds & lifts these evaporite rocks to the surface, where prior to that,they would have been buried deep in the subsurface. Evaporite minerals are easily dissolved in water, so once at the surface, they can be rapidly dissolved / eroded & carried into the ocean by rainwater / streams / rivers, thus potentially dramatically changing ocean chemistry in a short period of time, such as the article suggests. The Zagros belt is extremely extensive , so this isn’t an unreasonable hypothesis.
Thanks for the helpful clarification.
Has anyone done the maths to check if the Indian collision would mobilise enough Ca sulfate to significantly change the composition of the WHOLE ocean? There is a lot of seawater on the globe.
One factor not to ignore is biology. A lot of species took the “India Ferry”, meaning that they evolved over the period starting when India was connected to Antarctica, then broke away and headed equatorward over 100 MYr or so. When India hit Eurasia, they got off the ferry and substantially changed species makeup of Eurasia, both among plants and animals. I’m just speculating, but trees and tree grazing do have an influence on climate.
frank says:
July 22, 2012 at 2:58 pm
Yesterday I had an epitome.
No you didn’t.
And as to jellyfish and butterflies? Small potatoes.
http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b331/kevster1346/contrail.jpg
Tectonic plates move in centimeters per year. Using an average of 5 cm/yr, a plate might move 1500 miles in 50mm years. Some theories blame such drift for blocking the ocean water conveyor currents circulating cold/warm waters north and south. Also, such movement has been theorized to have changed wind patterns due to mountain range movements. Mountain ranges, of course, rise and fall over such periods as well moving due to plate movement. Any of these could also affect climate.
Sulfates, tectonic plate movements, solar cycles, earth orbital changes, earth axis variations, precession, volcanism, other geologic occurances, oceanic changes, cosmic impacts and potential cosmic ray interactions are all evidently of little importance to climate compared to the trace gas CO2.
clipe says:
July 22, 2012 at 9:05 pm
frank says:
July 22, 2012 at 2:58 pm
Yesterday I had an epitome.
Were you trying to have an epiphany? Or maybe just an appendectomy?
While fascinating in an academic sense the paper discusses geological processes in the distant past.Oceanographers are seeing a rapid, by geological standards, decrease in oceanic pH now.
What geological processes might be driving this?
This does not sound like a geological process.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18938002
Reblogged this on JustMEinT's General Blog and commented:
Oh No – you mean it might not be caused by a greedy uncaring egotistical and selfish humanity after all? What will they find to blame next me wonders (grin)
Entropic man says:
July 23, 2012 at 1:05 pm
While fascinating in an academic sense the paper discusses geological processes in the distant past. Oceanographers are seeing a rapid, by geological standards, decrease in oceanic pH now.
What geological processes might be driving this?
___________________________________________
POLITICS!
The CAGW scam is losing steam so the ocean “Acidification” scam is entering stage left as the next scare as we have been expecting for the last couple of years.
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” ~ H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)
The reason it is a complete hoax is explained HERE and a video of a simple experiment is HERE (Page down three times to get to the video)
This hoax is really a lot easier to kill than CAGW. It was tried during the same time frame as the “Ice Age Scare” in the 1970’s and they are hoping us old folks forgot…. We haven’t.
Entropic man says:
July 23, 2012 at 1:56 pm
This does not sound like a geological process.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18938002
________________________________
The BBC is a known propaganda rag.
In the words of Sir Michael Lyons, BBC Chairman
Here is the top 100 investments of the BBC Pension
Note that BP and Royal Dutch Shell, listed near the top, were original funders of the Climate Research Unit of East Anglia. A VP of Royal Dutch Shell, Ged Davis was active in the IPCC and the UN. ….within the Royal Dutch/Shell Group since 1972, Ged Davis is now Shell’s Head of Scenario Processes and Applications. In this capacity Davis recently headed the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s (WBCSD) Scenario Project team responsible for producing work on sustainable development from the international business community’s perspective. and until March 2007 [Davis was] Managing Director of the World Economic Forum, responsible for global research, scenario projects, and the design of the annual Forum meeting at Davos, Switzerland.
International businesses, the World Bank, the UN, the EU and the World Trade Organization all want to see Global Governance implemented. That is an international bureaucracy they control and we The Great Unwashed do not. CAGW and the environment are the means to that end. Once you understand that bit of politics everything else is easy.
The key reason for all these scare scenarios is explained by Pascal Lamy, Director General of the World Trade Organization
They plan to get that legitimacy, that buy in by the public by scaring us, hence CAGW and ocean acidification.
Dr Evans also goes in-depth on the politics of CAGW and the Regulating Class
(Please check out the links, they will give you a good deal of background info)
Gail Combs says:
July 23, 2012 at 2:56 pm
“The BBC is a known propaganda rag.”
Perhaps you would prefer another source.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21534-oceans-acidifying-at-unprecedented-speed.html
The original Science article is available if you wish to register.
That does it! The oceans must be chemically isolated from the atmosphere forthwith. The best way to do this is to cover them all with an oil sheen. Undersea vents and offshore oil deposits must be blown open, and their contents allowed to spread everywhere. A new agency, GOO (Grease Our Oceans) must be set up and lavishly funded.
Hurry!
Brian H,
That was Jimmy Carter’s solution to the evaporation problem at the Aswan dam. You could look it up!