From the University of Edinburgh and the department of soda pop science, comes something we already knew. I wonder who approved the grant for this one?
Rising global temperatures could increase the amount of carbon dioxide naturally released by the world’s oceans, fuelling further climate change, a study suggests.
Fresh insight into how the oceans can affect CO2 levels in the atmosphere shows that rising temperatures can indirectly increase the amount of the greenhouse gas emitted by the oceans.
Scientists studied a 26,000-year-old sediment core taken from the Gulf of California to find out how the ocean’s ability to take up atmospheric CO2 has changed over time.
They tracked the abundance of the key elements silicon and iron in the fossils of tiny marine organisms, known as plankton, in the sediment core. Plankton absorb CO2 from the atmosphere at the ocean surface, and can lock away vast quantities of carbon.
Researchers found that those periods when silicon was least abundant in ocean waters corresponded with relatively warm climates, low levels of atmospheric iron, and reduced CO2 uptake by the oceans’ plankton. Scientists had suspected that iron might have a role in enabling plankton to absorb CO2. However, this latest study shows that a lack of iron at the ocean surface can limit the effect of other key elements in helping plankton take up carbon.
This effect is magnified in the southern ocean and equatorial Pacific and coastal areas, which are known to play a crucial role in influencing levels of CO2 in the global atmosphere.
Researchers from the University of Edinburgh say their findings are the first to pinpoint the complex link between iron and other key marine elements involved in regulating atmospheric CO2 by the oceans. Their findings were verified with a global calculation for all oceans. The study, published in Nature Geoscience, was supported by Scottish Alliance for Geoscience Environment Society and the Natural Environment Research Council.
Dr Laetitia Pichevin, of the University of Edinburgh’s School of GeoSciences, who led the study, said: “Iron is known to be a key nutrient for plankton, but we were surprised by the many ways in which iron affects the CO2 given off by the oceans. If warming climates lower iron levels at the sea surface, as occurred in the past, this is bad news for the environment.”
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CO2, which is a monster of nature (more like a human product), and thus captured the attention of the scientific community and conquered the people to believe that this “Frankenstein” created by human activity, so dangerous to civilization, and we have to think of something that expelling him from the planet. But it seems that it is not so, because people do not see the logic of that CO2 can be somewhat dangerous to produce their very existence.
How many times more to produce heat in places where CO2 is produced than he himself contains all the properties that release heat?
Why is Earth’s atmosphere has cooled to its orbit around the sun, when the ambient temperature in which the planet passes, much lower than the lowest recorded on the surface of the earth? And so many of the same issues.
Are these experts have tried to analyze much more powerful and important causes, which “do their duty” according to the prescribed laws of nature. CO2 seems to have a special bait to be “fall into it” they will provide enrichment to the propaganda. Prohibition of CO2 and produces gas and everything related to it. With CO2 of which may not affect the climate changes, because they are the main causes of them much stronger natural factors.
“Rising global temperatures could increase the amount of carbon dioxide naturally released by the world’s oceans,… ”
Therefore CO2 lags temperature.
“…fuelling further climate change, a study suggests.”
Did it do that in the past?
@ur momisugly fadingfool:
your ‘simple equation’ yields a great explanation.
And: University of Edinburgh :
the Alma Mother of circulus vitiousus.
brg – Hans
Cheshirered says:
June 9, 2014 at 12:42 am
“CO2 causes ‘ocean acidification’ = BAD!
CO2 causes a ‘warmer atmosphere’ which causes oceans to out-gas CO2 = BAD!
Welcome yet again to the Climate Bunko Booth. ‘Heads we win, tails you lose, and EVERYTHING is due to CO2′”
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As someone will surely point out (Mosher?), there is so much CO2 now that more will be absorbed in the oceans and more will be out-gassed into the atmosphere so the net will be an increase in both.
Yes, you can have your cake and eat it too.
This is amazing! We now have proof of pre-Clovis Man! And pre-Clovis Man was far more sophisticated that thought possible.
“Scientists studied a 26,000-year-old sediment core”
I am uncomfortable with the relevance of the concentration of silicon and iron in the fossils. Fossilization is mineral replacement. It’s possible that these fossils were produced by permineralization, such that it wasn’t 100% replacement. Regardless, some portion of the fossils is minerals NOT from the time of origin of the organisms. It can take 10,000 years for fossilization to occur. Hence, making sweeping statements about the correlation of mineral content and temperatures seems suspicious. Fossils are best used to characterize conditions millions of years ago, not 26,000.
“Tom in Florida says:
June 9, 2014 at 4:35 am ”
The answer to those questions is; no-one knows!
Thank you for explaining why “ocean acidification” is not possible….
….and at the same time admitting you are all idiots
plankton needs N-P-K to make iron work…
Tom in Florida says:
June 9, 2014 at 4:35 am
“As someone will surely point out (Mosher?), there is so much CO2 now that more will be absorbed in the oceans and more will be out-gassed into the atmosphere so the net will be an increase in both. Yes, you can have your cake and eat it too.”
“So much”? It’s increased by oh, 1 part in 10,00. That’s it. And how does that feeble component compare with the fact oceans already contain orders of magnitude more CO2 than the atmosphere?
Thus the increase – whether human caused or not, is surely massively overwhelmed by existing ocean-borne CO2. The whole thing seems to be more propaganda-spin than ‘settled’ (or even likely) science.
The FIRST thing to remember about the ocean is that it is not a homogeneous system. Every variable is a local variable: temperature (affects the solubility of gases and all reaction rates), pressure (also affects the solubility of gases), motion (currents move stuff up or down, and from one region to another)
The SECOND thing to remember about the ocean is that everything in the ocean interacts with everything else. Acid interacts with carbonate and sulfate and silicate and everything else, pH changes the form of many chemicals (carbonate-bicarbonate, silicate-metasilicate, chlorinated iron-hydroxylated iron, etc.), and temperature and pH shift the balance between alternate forms of chemicals.
The THIRD thing to remember about the ocean is that everything on earth goes into the ocean – fresh water, sediment, minerals, rotting vegetation, industrial waste, septic waste, toxic waste, etc. – and everything that rain washes out of the atmosphere and everything the hundreds of known volcanoes on the ocean floor spew (heat, toxic metals, minerals, acid, sulfide gas) goes into the ocean.
The FOURTH thing to remember about the ocean is that pure water vapor and gases leave the ocean by evaporation and outgassing, and solids (dead animals, plankton, lime, and silica) leave the ocean be falling to the floor and being covered with sediment, along with whatever gets stuck to the solid particles, with the result that everything that doesn’t leace the ocean gets more concentrated, and everything that does leave the ocean gets more diluted.
If we just restrict ourselves to considering the 100 most important variables, we will have a system of 100 simultaneous non-linear differential equations, each with 100 terms, and each of the 10,000 coefficients in these equations will have a unique temperature dependence.
We simply do not have the understanding to write those 10,000 terms, or the technology to measure all of the variables in a useful resolution to comprehensively describe the oceans. We certainly do not have the computer technology or the modelling skills to try to solve those equations.
Excellent description “soda pop science”.
It is a little odd that the warmists who usually jump in to argue against oceans recently outgassing quantities of CO2 haven’t popped in to excoriate soda popped Edinburgh.
‘Researchers found that those periods when silicon was least abundant in ocean waters corresponded with relatively warm climates…’
I picked up a bag of sand recently and was informed on the bag that according to the State of California this material causes cancer. Well, whether they like it or not, these researchers have shown us that global warming reduces the rate of cancer. Therefore, if logic follows, efforts to reduce global warming cause cancer. Spread the word!
sarc
Hmmmm. So they are saying that increased CO2 FOLLOWS warming? Wow. Who knew. Oh…wait…
There is obviously no other solution, if the oceans leaches out all that toxic, dangerous and life threatening CO2 !! We HAVE TO DRAIN the Oceans. Only where do we drain them to ? Either that or we will end up with a gigantic carbonated soda fountain. What’ll we do?.. /sarc off
Yes the solubility of CO2 decreases with increasing temperature. Give these guys a government grant.
There is no shortage of iron and I would be surprised if the bulk of it came from the atmosphere!!! The earth’s crust is, what, 5% iron and erosion and river systems must be the biggest transporters of iron. Also, these guys are supposed to be from the department of geology. The composition of deposited materials doesn’t necessarily (and may not be expected to) remain the same over time.
Are there any geochemists out there or in the University of Edinburgh that could have been consulted?
ATheoK says:
June 9, 2014 at 5:57 am
“It is a little odd that the warmists who usually jump in to argue against oceans recently outgassing quantities of CO2 haven’t popped in…”
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The trolls have been concentrating their efforts on the last “Tol thread”. The “97% consensus” is all they have left and they are defending the claim for all they are worth, which doesn’t amount to much beyond the usual propagandist tricks.
This would break my mums heart as she went there when it was known for sound science.
James Bull
“Researchers from the University of Edinburgh say their findings are the first to pinpoint the complex link between iron and other key marine elements involved in regulating atmospheric CO2 by the oceans.”
Really? What complex link are they eluding to? Are they suggesting that through some inorganic process iron somehow keeps CO2 from degasing out of the ocean or are they suggesting that they are the first to say iron is the limiting nutrient in marine ecosystems and therefore more iron increases CaCO3 production and sequesters CO2 in the ocean?
Are they also claiming that from studying a single core they found that higher temperature somehow decreases the amount of iron delivered to the oceans worldwide? Oh nos! Now the oceans are going to run out of iron and the Earth will become like Venus, it’s worse than we thought!
“Plankton absorb CO2 from the atmosphere at the ocean surface” HAHA That’s a gem, now plankton must surface to breathe.
That supports the 800 year lag between temperatures and CO2. Since runaway warming has not been an issue in the past, the negative feedbacks need to be studied more to find out what is the governing factor of CO2. That has not been done with the latest hysteria.
If warming climates lower iron levels at the sea surface, as occurred in the past, this is bad news for the environment.”
That’s no problem for post-modern science Laetitia, if climate at any time in the past is not to your liking it can easily be changed. That’s the real meaning of “climate change”.
Were these fossils collected from above or below the depth of compensation? The other thing is that the depth of carbonate compensation is not vertically static through time.
Yes, and if atmospheric CO2 increases warming, which increases CO2, which increases warming, and so on, you have a positive feedback loop, and the Earth would have reached CO2 and temperature saturation eons ago, as I explained here.
Something important about the study area, which hopefully the researchers took into account. Anyone who is familiar with Southern Imperial County will know that in that area are found CO2 wells. It is one of the areas where CO2 is in abundance in the crust. I believe it is related to the fact that the East Pacific Rise reaches a triple junction just north of there. It is a rare instance of a spreading center being on land (due to the Colorado River’s delta having cut off that portion of the Gulf of California / Sea of Cortez leading to a dry basin). Presumably the existence of crustal CO2 is not limited to that part of the EPR and continues south down the Sea of Cortez and on out toward the Galapagos.
Bart on June 9, 2014 at 9:41 am
Yes, and if atmospheric CO2 increases warming, which increases CO2, which increases warming, and so on, you have a positive feedback loop, and the Earth would have reached CO2 and temperature saturation eons ago, as I explained here.
Indeed our CAGW friends are constantly invoking positive feedbacks without any understanding of what they’re actually saying and what the completely impossible implications are. Sadly it does not even have to make sense, just provide a suitable mood music for the MSM to latch onto.