Warmer seas will wipe out plankton, source of ocean life

[PaulaFarrell]

The microscopic plants that underpin all life in the oceans are likely to be destroyed by global warming, a study has found.

Scientists have discovered a way that the vital plankton of the oceans can be starved of nutrients as a result of the seas getting warmer. They believe the findings have catastrophic implications for the entire marine habitat, which ultimately relies on plankton at the base of the food chain.

The study is also potentially devastating because it has thrown up a new "positive feedback" mechanism that could result in more carbon dioxide ending up in the atmosphere to cause a runaway greenhouse effect.

Scientists led by Jef Huisman of the University of Amsterdam have calculated that global warming, which is causing the temperature of the sea surface to rise, will also interfere with the vital upward movement of nutrients from the deep sea.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article339596.ece


just gets worse and worse

[baby_mouse]

1. The planet has been quite a lot warmer in the past than it is now...

Runaway greenhouse isn't really new knowledge, unless there is some new mineral release of CO2 brought about by heat that's been found?

[baby_mouse]

2. Actually read article now

Sounds slightly tenuous, all my chemistry taught me the solubulity improves with high temperatures. If I saw a mechanism for how the nutrient transport was affected I'd feel more on solid ground to think clearly about these theories.

[PaulaFarrell]

7. I think it's related to ocean currents

No more upwelling so no nutrients to feed surface-dwelling life, which is most ocean life. As I understand it, nutrients drop to the ocean floor and then are moved back up through upwelling. I don't think it's anything to do with ability to absorb the nutrients. That's how I read it anyway.

[EuroObserver]

8. Any Nature subscribers here?

Warmer surface water caused by global warming causes greater temperature stratification, with warm surface layers sitting on deeper, colder layers, to prevent mixing of nutrients.
...
His computer model of the impact was tested on real measurements made in the Pacific Ocean, where sea surface temperatures tend to be higher than in other parts of the world. He found that his computer predictions of how nutrient movement would be interrupted were accurate.

"A larger temperature difference between two water layers implies less mixing of chemicals between these water layers," he said. "Global warming of the surface layers of the oceans, owing to climate change, strengthens the stratification and thereby reduces the upward mixing of nutrients."

... The Independent is running quite a campaign on environmental issues recently. Good thing too, but they'll have to be careful not to blow it with anything too speculative for the lay reader that could easily get shot down...

I'll have to access a copy of Nature. (I refuse to subscribe to the site).

[baby_mouse]

10. Ahhh...

skimmed rather than read, I see...

[bananas]

3. related post from the other day

There's an audio slide show at the sfgate article.

"Today's global warming snapshot: Reefs collapsing off Baja California"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x170917
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/17/MNGG0GOFQ11.DTL

[brokensymmetry]

4. Soylent Green

It might be time to dust off that old movie.

Remember, Tuesday is Soylent Green day!

[papau]

5. Bass fishing taking 75% tumored fish - some double sexed - warm water

& estrogen in waste water blamed.

This was on NPR a while back.

[phantom power]

6. I have this feeling that plankton will adapt relatively quickly.

all the larger life up the food chain, I don't think they will adapt as well. Big, complicated organisms like us are in for a real beating.

[philb]

9. why would you think plankton will adapt fairly rapidly?

some documentation on higher ocean surface temperatures,
effects on plankton and food chain
and more and bigger hurricanes,etc.
http://www.flcv.com/green.html

[phantom power]

11. Because they are microbes, and microbes evolve quickly.

[lakeguy]

13. tough to adapt without a food source. nt

[suneel112]

12. There are alternate theories, though

For example, most of the oil used in the world today was created by two gigantic blooms of phytoplankton occurring during periods of sharp global warming, 90 million years ago (North Sea, U.S., Mexico, and Venezuela) and 140 million years ago (Central Asia and the Middle East). While global warming will cause die-offs in marine life, I am not sure that it will kill plankton.

[kestrel91316]

14. As you sow, so shall you reap. We humans have REALLY.............

screwed the pooch.

I only get more and more depressed as time goes on and we hear more and more of this sort of thing. Makes me wonder why the hell I bother to do my part to mitigate the damage......... 99.9% of the human race doesn't give a rat's ass, and we are headed for the cliff.