The IPCC writes in the “leaked” SPM
It is very likely that oceanic uptake of anthropogenic CO2 results in acidification of the ocean. The pH 44 (see 7) of seawater has decreased by 0.1 since the beginning of the industrial era, corresponding to a 45 26% increase in hydrogen ion concentration. {3.8.2; Box 3.2; FAQ 3.2}
later they say:
Earth System Models project a worldwide increase in ocean acidification for all RCP scenarios. The 1 corresponding decrease in surface ocean pH by the end of 21st century is 0.065 (0.06 to 0.07)12 for 2 RCP2.6, 0.145 (0.14 to 0.15) for RCP4.5, 0.203 (0.20 to 0.21) for RCP6.0, and 0.31 (0.30 to 0.32) for 3 RCP8.5 (see Figures SPM.6 and SPM.7). {6.4.4}
Here are the figures cited, SPM6C and SPM7D:
Gosh, just look at all that scary, red, burning, “acid”. What they fail to note is that the oceans still haven’t turned acidic at the end of their model projections. The pH has to be below 7.0, and a drop to 7.75 by 2100 still doesn’t qualify by the way the pH scale works. Note also, like the Richter earthquake scale, the pH scale is logarithmic, not linear, a drop of 1 unit in pH equals a ten-fold increase in acidity. So, there would have to be an acceleration for their model scenarios to become true. Note the normal ranges of for rainwater and streamwater flowing into the oceans are far lower than the model projections:
![184phdiagram[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/184phdiagram1.gif)
Meanwhile, while the IPCC is “virtually certain” a call goes out via the X-prize to design a pH meter actually capable of monitoring the projected change. The X Prize Foundation announced a $2 million competition September 9th to spur innovation in the equipment used to measure “ocean acidification”. Here is the announcement. Note what I highlighted in red.
=============================================================
Overview
The Challenge: Improve Our Understanding of Ocean Acidification
The Wendy Schmidt Ocean Health XPRIZE is a $2 million global competition that challenges teams of engineers, scientists and innovators from all over the world to create pH sensor technology that will affordably, accurately and efficiently measure ocean chemistry from its shallowest waters… to its deepest depths.
There are two prize purses available (teams may compete for, and win, both purses):
A. $1,000,000 Accuracy award – Performance focused ($750,000 First Place, $250,000 Second Place): To the teams that navigate the entire competition to produce the most accurate, stable and precise pH sensors under a variety of tests.
B. $1,000,000 Affordability award – Cost and Use focused ($750,000 First Place, $250,000 Second Place): To the teams that produce the least expensive, easy-to-use, accurate, stable, and precise pH sensors under a variety of tests.
The Need for the Prize
Problem
Our oceans are currently in the midst of a silent crisis. Rising levels of atmospheric carbon are resulting in higher levels of acidity. The potential biological, ecological, biogeochemical and societal implications are staggering. The absorption of human CO2 emissions is already having a profound impact on ocean chemistry, impacting the health of shellfish, fisheries, coral reefs, other ecosystems and our very survival.
The Market Failure
While ocean acidification is well documented in a few temperate ocean waters, little is known in high latitudes, coastal areas and the deep sea, and most current pH sensor technologies are too costly, imprecise, or unstable to allow for sufficient knowledge on the state of ocean acidification.
Solution
Breakthrough sensors are urgently needed for scientists, managers and industry to turn the tide on ocean acidification and begin healing our oceans. A competition to incentivize the creation of these sensors for the study and monitoring of ocean acidification’s impact on marine ecosystems and ocean health will drive industry forward by providing the data needed to take action and produce results.
Impact
Making a broad impact—one that reaches far beyond new sensing technologies—is critical to the success of the prize. It begins with a breakthrough pH sensor that will catalyze our ability to measure—and thus respond to—ocean acidification.
Source: http://oceanhealth.xprize.org/competition-details/overview
==============================================================
In the NBC News story I cited about the announcement there was this:
“It is only in the last decade where scientists have begun to study ocean acidification, so our knowledge is really limited still,” Paul Bunje, a senior director with the X Prize Foundation who is the lead scientist behind the ocean health competition, told NBC News.
“But we do know that we don’t know enough, and we don’t have the tools needed to even begin to measure it sufficiently — much less to begin to respond, to adapt to it, to implement local policies that might allow ocean acidification to be less harmful,” he said.
…
The open ocean is acidifying at about .02 pH units per decade, according to according to Richard Feeley, a marine scientist and leading researcher on ocean acidification at NOAA’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle. “That means that you have to have an instrument that you can rely on to be both precise and accurate for a very, very long period of time, so that you can actually see that signal,” he told NBC News.
So, are the IPCC models based on uncertain measurements and an assumed trend? It sure seems so.
It’s like a bad acid trip.
CRS, DrPH says:
September 25, 2013 at 10:14 pm
Not toxic in the atmosphere, but at the air/water interface of the ocean, where it forms carbonic acid and causes the most inhibition.
Fortunately, the change of total carbon (CO2 + bicarbonates + carbonates) in the surface layer is only 10% of the change in the atmosphere. Thus the 30% increase over the past 160 years only gives a 3% increase of total inorganic carbon in the ocean surface, mainly as bicarbonate, which is the bulk of the carbon. CO2/H2CO3 is less than 1% in the ocean surface. The smaller uptake is a matter of pH change, which changes the equilibria towards free CO2 (that is the Revelle factor).
I doubt that that will have much impact: the buildup of the coccoliths shell is from bicarbonate which has increased a little in concentration with the CO2 increase. The pH theoretically changed with about 0.1 unit over these 160 years, but as milodonharlani showed in a previous message, coccoliths easely adapt to future conditions with 800 generations over the next decades. Seems that their genes still contain the information from the Cretaceous with much higher CO2 and temperature levels.
dbstealey says:
September 25, 2013 at 11:36 pm
Ferdinand, my friend, they do that all the time.
Should have said: “We” don’t take temperature measurements made on a hot asphalt parking lot as representing local area temperatures… But we shouldn’t take historical measurements taken near huge sources and sinks as representing the global CO2 level in the atmosphere either…
“dbstealey says:
September 25, 2013 at 11:23 pm”
I don’t know about you however, I see this all the time. Alarmist posts are made with links to alarmist and fairly misleading articles. It seems to me, and you clearly demonstrate, some people simple don’t seem to read the article in full, or if they do, they simply don’t understand what they are reading. I guess everyone can make a mistake.
FerdiEgb says:
September 25, 2013 at 3:02 pm
[units for sigma CO2 per 1000 ? Mod]
δ13C is the ratio of 13C/12C of a substance compared to the ratio in a standard: in the past Pee Dee Belemnite (PDB), a calcite deposit in the US, but currently a theoretical standard (Vienna or VPDB), thus unitless. The formula used is:
(13C/12C)sampled – (13C/12C)standard
——————————––––––––––––––– x 1.000
(13C/12C)standard
The results are expressed in per mil. Lower values means a lower 13C/12C ratio of the sample.
Inorganic carbonates in general are around zero per mil, including chalk deposits, volcanic and ocean CO2. Organic (current and fossil) in general is much lower in δ13C as photosynthesis and other biological processes slightly discriminates for 12CO2 above 13CO2. Phase changes (emissions from the ocean surface, dissolution, evaporation, condensation) also discriminate between the isotopes…
The recycling of the same old debunked alarmist lies produced by an official UN Institution that claims it only brings the “Gold Standard in Scientific Climate Research” is not only an insult to our intelligence.
It completely destroys the trust people have, not only in her political bodies, the integrity of her officials and her objectives but also in the trust of the establishment associated with the UN.
This also affects the man and women participating in UN peace, security and rescue missions wearing the UN uniform.
This really is a very serious subject as the UN claims to be a leading entity in matters beyond world politics, war and peace.
The UN, all her related institutions and NGO’s must realize that they receive most of their funding through the tax contributions and donations from the very people they deceive so cowardly.
Thanks to the internet and blogs like WUWT people know what the UN is cooking up for them and
we have arrived at a point in time where the UN performance on so many fields has become such a great disappointment that there will be grave consequences if no fundamental change takes place.
Already we hear public voices making calls to defund the UN and remove her offices from US soil and these voices have become louder and louder.
After watching yet another Pauchari dog and pony show people are not only bored.
They are fed up with the UN and the entire establishment.
Who is happiest when the UN is in town?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-09-25/who-happiest-when-un-town
Science really is in a terrible state. I think they should put up a prize for an “Ether Detector”. A while ago there was an overwhelming consensus that light travelled in a medium called the Ether. We never actually found it, so we need a detector for that.
“This isn’t a Monstrometer, it’s a Frog Exaggerator”… The Simpsons
This isn’t Ocean Acidification, it’s my pH meter next to the sewer…
***
CRS, DrPH says:
September 25, 2013 at 7:54 pm
as are other indicator organisms such as rainbow trout (very sensitive to dissolved oxygen concentrations).
***
Hmm. Rainbow trout are thriving in my little border stream. If they have an issue, it’s competition from the introduced bluegills (Lepomis macrochirus). The bluegills are native to nearby rivers/creeks/ponds, but I don’t think originally in tiny, cold, mountain streams like mine.
***
CRS, DrPH says:
September 25, 2013 at 7:54 pm
***
To add, both the bluegills & trout are surprisingly easy to “train”. With little time, I was able to get them to eat crushed catfood out of my hand, first underwater, then jumping out of the water to my hand 6 inches or more above the water. They really like chicken skin or beef/ham fat.
You are a lucky fellow! No, bluegills don’t like water as cold as trout, but they are very sensitive to low oxygen levels & presence of toxicants. Being members of the black bass family, they are hardier than trout. My point is that we ecotoxicologists monitor these organisms in the field and lab to measure biological stressors.
This map shows distribution of early mortality due to airborne pollution (they focus upon particulates, but particulates and organic pollutants track well). http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=82087&eocn=home&eoci=iotd_title
China (and lately India) are going nuts, incinerating tons of plastics and other wastes with no scrubbers or other air pollution equipment. VOCs, metals, particulates of all kinds are pouring into the air. Put all this junk into the oceans along with elevated carbon dioxide levels, and the euphotic zone biota become stressed. Undergrad Ecology 101.
The oceans can only become acidic if the earth runs out of rocks.
The oceans are a buffer solution – more CO2 increases the amount of soluble Calcium bicarbonate (alkaline) made by carbonic acid reacting with insoluble limestone, Calcium carbonate.
Again, I am not concerned with the vast volume of the world’s oceans, but only the shallow euphotic zone which overlays the waters. There isn’t much limestone bobbing around in the euphotic zone, last time I looked.
Oceanography 101 http://www.oceanclassrooms.com/ms101_u7_c2_sa_1
Ok this is a surprise from wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alkalinity
Addition of CO2[edit]
The addition (or removal) of CO2 to a solution does not change the alkalinity. This is because the net reaction produces the same number of equivalents of positively contributing species (H+) as negative contributing species (HCO3- and/or CO32-).
At neutral pH values:
CO2 + H2O → HCO3− + H+
At high pH values:
CO2 + H2O → CO32- + 2H+
How did Bill Connely let that slip by ???
Sun Spot says:
“How did Bill Connely let that slip by ???”
Wiki’s right. Count the charges in your reaction (equivalents).
TA change is effectively change of charge balance (of reacting species). CO2 brings no charge.
CRS, DrPH says:
September 26, 2013 at 2:11 pm
Had you ever actually studied ocean chemistry, you’d know that many elements, compounds & processes buffer the euphotic zone & serve to transfer CO2 from it to lower depths, to include P & the simple detritus of organic origin. There are so many papers on this topic that I leave it to you to find them. My advice would be to study the topic before commenting upon it. You’re welcome.
MIke (UK) says:
September 25, 2013 at 9:48 am
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it’s not Acidification it’s Neutralization, its go to go past ph7 first!
And you were wrong both times! Neutralization is the act of changing pH to exactly 7 at T=25ºC.
ZootCadillac says:
September 25, 2013 at 10:02 am
This is one of my greatest bugbears. When will somebody stand up and say that slightly less alkalinity does not in any way, shape or form equate to acidification?
Thereby indicating that you don’t know what alkalinity is, hint it is not the same as basicity!
pH changes when CO2 is added to seawater, alkalinity does not.
1. The [always wrong] alarmist crowd has been insisting that the oceans are warming. [That is where they believe the hidden heat is hiding.]
2. Henry’s Law states that warming oceans will outgas CO2, thus making oceans less acidic.
3. This glaring contradiction is glossed over by the alarmist cult, which, having been proved wrong in every prediction they ever made, has now decided that the oceans are both warming and acidifying.
So far, their batting average remains at 0.000.
dbstealey says:
September 26, 2013 at 9:17 pm
As near as I can tell, CACA spewers claim that CO2 may be outgassing from lower depths, but man-made gas in the air is mixing with the higher layers, producing “acidification”, by which I take them to mean “neutralizing”, ie causing slightly less alkaline surface concentrations (which sounds like a good thing to me).
They should know about outgassing!
dbstealey says: September 26, 2013 at 9:17 pm
“2. Henry’s Law states that warming oceans will outgas CO2, thus making oceans less acidic.”
Surely you mean, more alkaline 🙂 But yes it does. If you pour petrol over an object and light it, combustion-forced evaporation of the petrol will cool the object. So the body is both warming and cooling.
If you add CO2 to the air, it forces CO2 into the ocean directly (Henry’s Law). It also causes warming, which as a secondary effect causes outgassing. The question is whether that counters the primary absorption.
milodonharlani,
Thus, the CACA contingent continues its failed tactic of “Say Anything.”
Since there is zero empirical, measurable scientific evidence that global warming is hiding undetected in the lower depths of the oceans, they claim that based on the “Say Anything” tactic of avoiding the Scientific Method, that the oceans must be ‘acidifying’ due to the addition of a tiny trace gas to the atmosphere. As if. Post testable, reproducible evidence right here… or Say Anything. That’s the sad choice for alarmists.
Observe Phil.’s verbal tapdancing. For example:
“pH changes when CO2 is added to seawater, alkalinity does not”
OK then, suppose that CO2 is outgassed from sea water instead of being added. According to Phil., his “Say Anything” response implies that only pH changes — never alkalinity!
Of course, that is absurd. But rather than admit that there is no testable, verifiable evidence from the planet’s oceans showing that the rise in human-emitted CO2 is causing a measurable change in pH directly attributable to our emissions, Phil. decides to “Say Anything”, in the hope that a few heads will start noddig along with his.
That doesn’t happen here at the internet’s “Best Science” site. Phil. can’t put up — so he ‘says anything’. That’s pseudo-science. That’s Phil.
========================
Nick Stokes,
Take an aspirin and lie down. A cold compress would help, too.
dbstealey says:
September 26, 2013 at 9:17 pm
2. Henry’s Law states that warming oceans will outgas CO2, thus making oceans less acidic.
No it doesn’t, how do you explain the annual rise in CO2 without a concomitant increase in SST?
dbstealey says:
September 26, 2013 at 9:17 pm
2. Henry’s Law states that warming oceans will outgas CO2, thus making oceans less acidic.
According to the solubility of CO2 in seawater, an increase of 1°C will increase the pressure of CO2 in the water layer with ~16 µatm in equilibrium with the atmosphere. Thus an increase of 16 16 µatm (~16 ppmv) in the atmosphere will bring the dynamic exchanges back into equilibrium. But we see an increase of 100+ ppmv over the past 160 years (70+ since 1960). Thus, per Henry’s law, the flux is from the atmosphere into the oceans, causing some less alkalinity in the surface layer of the oceans.
Another observation also indicates that: if the temperature increases (or the pH is lowered by some other factor, like undersea volcanic SO2 releases) and CO2 is released from the oceans, then the total inorganic carbon (DIC) would decrease by an increasing pH (temperature) or a decreasing pH (volcanoes). If the net CO2 flux is reverse, then DIC will increase (with a decreasing pH).
The latter is what is observed in a few fixed stations and regular research ship measurements over the past decades…
Ferdinand Engelbeen said on September 27, 2013 at 12:00 am:
With all due respect, I think you are slightly mistaken. The regular research ship measurements are of pCO2, not DIC (see Takahashi et al. 2009) as stated in my comment on September 25, 2013 at 2:46 pm.
From Dore et al 2009 in my comment:
Reference (8) is Sabine, C. L., R. A. Feely, F. J. Millero, A. G. Dickson, C. Langdon, S. Mecking, and D. Greeley (2008), Decadal changes in Pacific carbon, J. Geophys. Res., 113, C07021, doi:10.1029/2007JC004577.
As with downwelling long-wave radiation, where the uncertainty of the pyrgeometers used to measure a claimed 3.39 Wm-2 was as much as 30 Wm-2 as of 2003, while Kyoto was enacted in December 1997 (see my comment here), ocean acidification is being claimed as a big problem before sufficient data has been collected to confirm it. The X-prize would seem to be because they urgently need to make pH measurements in the oceans where few such measurements exist:
From Dore et al. 2009:
So, it would appear that “time-series” pH records only exist at 4 locations and none from ocean cruises.