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What would happen where you live if all the ice melted?


Fragile Bird

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From what I understand, the current (don't mind the pun) view in Oceanography is that the salinity is not as threatened as previously thought.

The Gulf Stream transports warm, salty water from the Gulf of Mexico to the north-eastern part of the North Atlantic, where it during winter gives off its heat to the surrounding cold air. This is considered the main cause that Scandinavia has a much milder climate than Alaska. It has been a common belief that the melting of Greenland's glaciers, as a result of global warming, could cause the Gulf Stream to collapse - thereby giving northern Europe a much tougher climate. Not least, Al Gore's film An Inconvenient Truth, a decade ago helped to make this scenario known. Since then, however, knowledge has increased and I would say that most skilled scientists today estimates that the Gulf Stream is not threatened. I'll try to explain why.

When the Gulf Stream is cooled by the northern Atlantic Ocean, including the Arctic Ocean, its waters sink into the deep sea, from where it spreads by bottom currents to all the oceans. Both cooling and the North Atlantic's unusually high salinity are necessary for this process - hence the fear that melting glaciers freshwater interrupt this important mechanism. But it is not only the ocean currents that move water and affect salinity, but also winds. The North Atlantic has higher salinity than the Pacific due to the moist trade winds carrying huge amounts of water vapor (fresh water) from the Atlantic to the Pacific through low mountain pass on the Isthmus of Panama. The winds that blow in the opposite direction, from the Pacific to the Atlantic, passing contrast high mountain ranges - the Andes and Rocky Mountains - where they emptied of its moisture. It is therefore generated a net flow of about 200,000 cubic meters of fresh water per second from the Atlantic to the Pacific, which maintains the high salinity in the Atlantic and the low salinity in the northern part of the Pacific Ocean.

During the closing phase of the last ice age in North America, there were probably times when very large amounts of pent-up fresh water in a short time flowed into the North Atlantic, leading to a cap of fresher surface water being established in the North Atlantic, which for some time could stop the Gulf Stream. However, the constant transport of freshwater across the Isthmus of Panama soon restored the North Atlantic higher surface salinity so that the process started again. As the Greenland ice is only about 7 percent of the volume that the ice in North America had before melting, and survived melting during the last Ice Age, it is unlikely that increased future melting of the Greenland ice sheet could come up in such large flows of deep water formation that the North Atlantic is threatened. In addition, the water transport in the atmosphere from the Atlantic to the Pacific would increase as the climate gets warmer.

/ Anders Stigebrandt, researcher, professor emeritus of Oceanography, University of Gothenburg
eta: my translation
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The amount the Gulf Stream warms Britain by and the temperature of the stream itself aren't the same thing. The surface water temperature around Britain looks to be at least 10 degrees warmer than it would be without the stream, so even if there was a uniform 4 degree increase, the loss of the stream would still drop local surface water temperature by at least 6 degrees. I'm not sure how much that drop would affect land temperatures, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was close to 4 degrees.

That actually makes sense thank you.

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From what I understand, the current (don't mind the pun) view in Oceanography is that the salinity is not as threatened as previously thought.

yes this is true...though the discussion changes from year to year...i am of the opinion that disrupting gulf stream will cause issues but not to the extent previously believed...for example "the day after tomorrow" is hollywood, not science

as a side note...i fucking love science :commie:

articles some may feel are relevant...

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2004/05mar_arctic/

this contests earlier theories

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/new-simulations-question-gulf-stream-role-tempering-europes-winters/

and here is a study i think is valid

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ayako_Yamamoto/publication/274566939_Ocean_versus_atmosphere_control_on_western_European_wintertime_temperature_variability/links/5526a4e90cf2647b189e3b89.pdf

i believe ocean currents and wind patterns determine climate in many areas but disagree that we understand exactly how melting ice will disrupt/change the flows as we know them. as i saw Ser Scot say (and agree with) climate is a dynamic system that we barely understand and have only been recording for a micro blink of time...i also support the theory that our climate has been more stable than normal during our known "recorded history"...

off topic but important to say - my darling Bird, i am loving this thread....

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Tripp, I agree with your opinion. The way I see it we can't know enough to be sure how the changes will present themselves. Since science figures out more and more - who knows, we may return at thinking the change will be more dramatic, tomorrow or next year. My opinion is that the risk presented should be the most important factor in decisionmaking.


Will check your links later!


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Tripp, I agree with your opinion. The way I see it we can't know enough to be sure how the changes will present themselves. Since science figures out more and more - who knows, we may return at thinking the change will be more dramatic, tomorrow or next year. My opinion is that the risk presented should be the most important factor in decisionmaking.

Will check your links later!

i agree the risk is the issue. particularly because many believe, and i count myself as one, setting up population-free zones along vulnerable coastlines should be a priority, as well as locating powerplants further inland in order to mitigate that situation from becoming a problem.

shockingly people forget that the coastal estuaries, critical to marinelife survival, can not stand even 1 meter of inundation by salt water. this is one of the most important issues in the gulf of mexico and other similar shallow basins facing the world today, in my opinion.

it brings me back to Fragile Bird's OP. its the next generation that shall be impacted worst...it is kids like my nieces who are 12 and 6...where will they live, love and fish, i wonder...

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i agree the risk is the issue. particularly because many believe, and i count myself as one, setting up population-free zones along vulnerable coastlines should be a priority, as well as locating powerplants further inland in order to mitigate that situation from becoming a problem.

shockingly people forget that the coastal estuaries, critical to marinelife survival, can not stand even 1 meter of inundation by salt water. this is one of the most important issues in the gulf of mexico and other similar shallow basins facing the world today, in my opinion.

it brings me back to Fragile Bird's OP. its the next generation that shall be impacted worst...it is kids like my nieces who are 12 and 6...where will they live, love and fish, i wonder...

Won't they just slowly move inland with the rising water?

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Proper ecological estuaries take a long time to form, iirc.

How long? How long are they expecting it to take for the ice to all melt? I mean, 1 meter rise in salt water and all those creatures just die off?

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It was impossible to see how bad it would get here on the animation in the OP, Birdie. But I live on the coast opposite Denmark :( Bye bye Danes

Oh, the danes will survive we Norwegians will take them in

The danish and other refuges would be the way we Norwegians would be most afected, seriusly only smal parts of norway would get flooded even with 60+ meters rise in the sea levels and most of the large cities would escape the rise prety eassily.

My city would be one of the largest ports in the world that would not be underwater so the economy shuld be bomming when the situation stabilizes

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Won't they just slowly move inland with the rising water?



no the vegetation, mangroves for example, that they use will die as a result of too much/deep sea water . in addition the delta regions will be drowned as well, causing sediment build up polluting the stream beds leading to the coast where many ocean species spawn. also barrier island migration etc...i have linked some papers on this below



i encourage people to do some investigation, particularly those who live on a coastline. everyone always focuses on carbon build up and warming trying to see big picture, when the issues that matter to folks, thus creating a sense of urgency, are the ones in their local areas....



more info i think is relevant...not all these agree on the causes but most agree on the consequences...



coastal impacts



more coastal impacts



and more



eta: science at work...i love it!


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