Over at Grist, where “burnt out” David Roberts just threw in the towel, the craziness continues with a new alarmist writer:
Vanishing ocean smell could also mean fewer clouds
By John Upton
Next time you’re at the beach take a deep, long sniff: That special coastal scent might not last forever. While you’re at it, put on some extra sunscreen: As that smell dwindles, cloud cover could, too.
The unique oceanside smell that flows over your olfactory organs is loaded with sulfur — dimethylsulfide, to be exact, or DMS. It’s produced when phytoplankton decompose. And it’s a fragrant compound that’s as special as it smells: In the atmosphere it reacts to produce sulfuric acid, which aids in the formation of clouds.
But it’s a smell that’s endangered by climate change. Experiments have linked the rising acidity of the world’s oceans to falling levels of DMS.
Gosh, it’s just double plus terrifying. Marc Morano quips:
New Warmist Fear: Global warming causing the oceans to lose their smell! Oceans unique odor is a ‘smell that’s endangered by climate change’ — ‘The real horror might be raising kids in a world where the only place you can smell the ocean is Bath & Bodyworks.’
Kramer’s fragrance “The Beach” might also be a last refuge.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
JimS says:
August 28, 2013 at 10:13 am
“Maybe I should submit something like this to The Onion.”
The Onion has outlived its usefulness as it is no more capable of producing content that differentiates itself from mainstream news.
Here is the paper in Nature that was conveniently not referenced in the above article
http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate1981.html
Global warming amplified by reduced sulphur fluxes as a result of ocean acidification
Katharina D. Six, Silvia Kloster, Tatiana Ilyina, Stephen D. Archer, Kai Zhang & Ernst Maier-Reimer
Nature Climate Change (2013) doi:10.1038/nclimate1981 Received 18 September 2012 Accepted 17 July 2013 Published online 25 August 2013
.
Here we establish observational-based relationships between pH changes and DMS concentrations to estimate changes in future DMS emissions with Earth system model climate simulations. Global DMS emissions decrease by about 18(±3)% in 2100 compared with pre-industrial times as a result of the combined effects of ocean acidification and climate change. The reduced DMS emissions induce a significant additional radiative forcing, of which 83% is attributed to the impact of ocean acidification, tantamount to an equilibrium temperature response between 0.23 and 0.48 K. Our results indicate that ocean acidification has the potential to exacerbate anthropogenic warming through a mechanism that is not considered at present in projections of future climate change.
.
-unless you knew already, sulfur compounds in the atmosphere help to reflect sunlight away from the earth and lead to increases in cooling. This is the reason that the earth gets colder after a stratospheric volcano eruption.
Well given the observation that the highest ocean surface temperatures achievable are ~31C (equatorial zone) as a result of the Eschenbach Effect, the sea down there should not smell at all. I spent some time in the equatorial zone in Africa and I recall a pretty universal smell to the sea.
@DirkH
“The Onion has outlived its usefulness as it is no more capable of producing content that differentiates itself from mainstream news.”
Given the magic of dry humour and the heading under which these comments come, I appreciated that comment beyond imagination.
To be replaced by the fragrance of climatology ?
I think the ocean be much less malodorous.
Dimethyl sulfide, has a nice smell? If you like the smell of overcooked cabbage, maybe. The stuff in a liter bottle doesn’t smell at all good.
From jai mitchell on August 28, 2013 at 10:35 am:
You forgot to co-bitch about not providing the link to the originating Grist article, where that paper’s link is found:
http://grist.org/news/vanishing-ocean-smell-could-also-mean-fewer-clouds/
Where it’s mentioned there was also an “explainer article” in Nature:
http://www.nature.com/news/rising-ocean-acidity-will-exacerbate-global-warming-1.13602
From which was quoted:
Could, positive-feedback loop, IPCC, “increase by 2.1 to 4.4 °C by the year 2100”, the model projected…
All this good juicy and obviously-truthful stuff in the main article, and you “conveniently” don’t provide the link?
jai mitchell says:
August 28, 2013 at 10:35 am
That’s not the point of the reduced DMS emissions, anything they turn into will be washed out of the atmosphere long before they can get to the stratosphere.
DMS is involved with one of the several steps behind the Svensmark hypothesis.
Plankton die, rot, release DMS. DMS leaves the water, transforms into sulphate. Cosmic rays trigger showers of muons, which reach the lower atmosphere and ionize air and suphates, which bind together and grow to form condensation nuclei in what otherwise is clean, supersaturated air. Clouds form and reflect sunlight.
Much more information is available elsewhere, but that’s the capsule summary.
Does John Upton know the “special coastal scent” is rotting vegetation, rotting fish, rotting plankton and the odd rotting dolphin?
I think I know that gal at Bath and Bodyworks he’s talking about.
vukcevic says August 28, 2013 at 9:47 am
Maybe the penguin is clanging a pair of cymbals, trying to wake up the snoozing polar
bearfield strength. Or someone’s gorged one too many chocolate liqueurs.‘dimethylsulfide, … it’s produced when phytoplankton decompose. And it’s a fragrant compound.’
“Fragrant” is an understatement.
It has been identified as one of the primary odorants in feces: “Volatile organic compounds from feces and their potential for diagnosis of gastrointestinal disease”, Garner, et al., June 2007
The FASEB Journal vol. 21 no. 8 1675-1688
“While you’re at it, put on some extra sunscreen: As that smell dwindles, cloud cover could, too.”
??? Who chooses to go to the beach when it’s cloudy as I don’t ever recall anyone I know saying “great, it’s cloudy, lets go to the beach”.
One has to wonder when AGW is going to be blamed for the heartache of Psoriasis.
Funny, I’ve always disliked that “ocean smell” along shoreline, and I’ve long associated it with “rotting seaweed” although I didn’t have a scientific knowledge of what causes it….. Anyway, I wouldn’t miss that smell one bit…. However, like many Alarmist memes, this one is probably more fragrant b.s.
Any sailor will tell you that the ocean has no smell. Land smells. That “sea smell” is the smell of decaying vegetation at the shoreline.
You mean… in years to come, children won’t even know what a beach smells like? Just checking.
“But it’s a smell that’s endangered by climate change. Experiments have linked the rising acidity of the world’s oceans to falling levels of DMS.”
Since ocean acidity HAS NOT BEEN RISING as they claim and has remained within the normal range, this “research” must be either bogus or poorly done. Just bad science
Oh, my………………….what floors me is that this stuff actually gets reported1
More CO2 means more biota which leads to more rotting which leads to more SO2 which leads to more nuclei which leads to more precipitation. Problem fixed.
Ocean acidity ?
Another Carbon Di-oxymoron?
SteveT
I love to smell the ocean in the morning. It is a sign of CAGW victory! LOL!
The beaches of my northern youth were much more “ocean smelling” and that was sixty or more years ago. The reason may have been phytoplanktons but i’m more inclined to the belief that it was rotting seaweed. And of course there was less CO2 around. Last week I spent a few days on the Outer Banks of NC. No rotting seaweed and no “ocean smell” even when one actually entered the water. But there were plenty of clouds – some days 10/10ths all day (and night). I think I need a government grant to spend a lot more time on the Outer Banks to study this hypothesis as the evidence right now seems tenuous and contradictory. I’d promise to spend most of the time in or near the water…..
Next you know someone will get a government grant to research how CAGW increases the flatulence of rodents.
Another one putting the cart before the horse.
Warming occurs when cloud cover over the oceans decreases. Warming
reduces or cooling begins as cloud cover increases. It’s not the other way
around.
A good analogy is the process by which temperature in green houses is
managed by drawing curtains over the glass roof panels to cool the green
house (akin to more clouds) or drawing them back to further warm the
greenhouse (akin to fewer clouds).
Cloud cover over the oceans has been steadily increasing most of this decade,
indicating a cooling trend. Graphs of ocean cloud cover are maintained by Bob
Tisdale at his great blog