Seawater carbonate chemistry and community calcification during Shiraha coral reef (Ishigaki Island, Japan) studies, 1995

• Main Author: Suzuki, Yoshimi
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 1995
• Subjects: Alkalinity; total; Aragonite saturation state; Benthos; Bicarbonate ion; Calcification/Dissolution; Calcification rate of calcium carbonate; Calcite saturation state; Calculated; Calculated using CO2SYS; Calculated using seacarb after Nisumaa et al. (2010); Carbon; inorganic; dissolved; Carbonate ion; Carbon dioxide; Coast and continental shelf; DATE/TIME; DEPTH; water; Entire community; EPOCA; EUR-OCEANS; European network of excellence for Ocean Ecosystems Analysis; European Project on Ocean Acidification; Experimental treatment; Field observation; Fugacity of carbon dioxide (water) at sea surface temperature (wet air); Measured; OCE; Oceanography; Partial pressure of carbon dioxide (water) at sea surface temperature (wet air); pH; Radiation; photosynthetically active; Rocky-shore community; Salinity; Suzuki_95; Temperate; Temperature; Ocean acidification
• Online Access: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.721925; https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.721925

Only about half of all the CO_2 that has been produced by the burning of fossil fuels now remains in the atmosphere. The CO_2 "missing" from the atmosphere is the subject of an important debate. It was thought that the great majority of the missing CO_2 has invaded the ocean, for this system naturally acts as a giant chemical regulator of the atmosphere. Although it is clear that ocean processes have a major role in the regulation of the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere through air-sea exchange processes, recent studies of the oceanic carbon cycle and air-sea interaction indicate that oceanic carbon is in a quasi-steady state via the system of biological and physical processes in the ocean interior. It is difficult to determine whether the ocean has the capacity to take up the increasing air-born CO_2 released by human activities over the past five or six decades. To understand this enigma, we need a better understanding of the natural variability of the oceanic carbon cycle.