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from the buffers-work-up-to-a-point-and-then-all-hell-breaks-loose dept.
If circulation of deep waters in the Atlantic stops or slows due to climate change, it could cause cooling in northern North America and Europe – a scenario that has occurred during past cold glacial periods.
Now, a Rutgers coauthored study suggests that short-term disruptions of deep ocean circulation [also] occurred during warm interglacial periods in the last 450,000 years, and may happen again.
Ironically, melting of the polar ice sheet in the Arctic region in a warmer world, resulting in more fresh water entering the ocean and altering circulation, might have caused previous coolings.
[...] The study, published in the journal Science and led by scientists at the University of Bergen in Norway, follows a 2014 study on the same topic.
"These findings suggest that our climate system, which depends greatly on deep ocean circulation, is critically poised near a tipping point for abrupt disruptions," said coauthor Yair Rosenthal, a distinguished professor in the Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences and Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Rutgers University–New Brunswick. "Although the disruptions in circulation and possible coolings may be relatively short-lived – lasting maybe a century or more – the consequences might be large."
The warm North Atlantic Current -- the northernmost part of the Gulf Stream -- flows into the Greenland Sea. It becomes progressively colder and saltier due to heat loss to the air, eventually sinking and forming the North Atlantic Deep Water formation -- a mass of deep, cold water that flows southward. Melting of the polar ice sheet in the Arctic region would result in more fresh water entering the ocean and disrupting that circulation pattern, potentially causing cooling in northern areas of Europe and North America.
[...] The latest study covers three other warm interglacial periods within the past 450,000 years. During all of them, regardless of the degree of global warming, the scientists found similar century-long disruptions of the North Atlantic Deep Water formation. And they found that such disruptions are more easily achieved than once believed and took place in climate conditions similar to those we may soon face with global warming.
Journal Reference:
Eirik Vinje Galaasen, Ulysses S. Ninnemann, Augustin Kessler, et al. Interglacial instability of North Atlantic Deep Water ventilation. Science, 2020 DOI: 10.1126/science.aay6381
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2020, @01:15PM
Clickbait article-not because it is incorrect, but rather this is just another retelling of what has been known for decades.
It's like an a new article published that says "Geologists confirm the theory of plate tectonics" (known since the 60's) or "Physicists confirms Newton's laws of motion" (known for centuries). But I suppose for many it's new for you.
Even in the 80's oceanography (a real science) suspected (knew?) the gulf stream and other currents were not immutable and their current intensity exists as it is today simply due to our current global climate.
Anyways, climatology has become the astrology of the sciences. Climatologist predictions are so ambiguous they make fortune cookies, alchemists, or astrologers look exact.
They cover all the cases and possibilities with ambiguous predictions of "May warm, may cool, may rise, may increase rainfall, may decrease rainfall, may decrease food production, may increase food production, may flood, may dry up" so obviously when the regional climates do change 10, 50, 100 years from now they can say "Look at how we predicted it! Look at how right we were" and the public will eat it up.
Every time it's more of the same old, wishy-washy predictions from a wishy-washy poorly-predictable science that has fooled the public into thinking they can predict what will happen.
Remember that climatologists are so alarmed by their predictions that they sacrifice themselves by the thousands to fly to dozens of climate change conferences, all inclusive, all over the world every year in GHG spewing jets. Well they did up to the covid crisis, but once that is over I'm sure it will begin again. Free flights, free 5* hotels, smorgasbord of food cooked by world renowned chefs, $100 bottles of wine...just for saying "I predict the climate might warm or it might cool or it might stay the same."
What dedication!!
More like what a racket!