Impacts and effects of ocean warming on the weather

• Main Authors: Bigg, Grant, Hanna, Edward
• Other Authors: Baxter, J. M., Laffoley, Daniel D'A.
• Format: Book Part
• Language: unknown
• Published: IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) 2016
• Subjects: F332 Marine Physics; Arctic; Antarctic; Pacific; Antarc*; Global warming; Iceberg*; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://eprints.lincoln.ac.uk/id/eprint/26479/; https://www.openchannels.org/sites/default/files/literature/Explaining%20ocean%20warming%20Causes,%20scale,%20effects%20and%20consequences.pdf

The heat content of the upper 700 m of the global ocean is ~ 120x1021 J higher than in 1995, the equivalent of ~ 240 times the human global energy consumption in 2013. • Since the 1990s the atmosphere in the polar regions has been warming at about twice the average rate of global warming. • There is likely to be further major loss, and possibly the essential removal in some years, of summer Arctic sea ice in the next 5-15 years. • The extent of Antarctic sea ice has been growing at a rate of ~1.3% per decade, although there is strong interannual variability. • Over the last 20 years there has been a distinct change in the El Niño events, with a shift of the mean location of sea surface temperature anomalies towards the central Pacific. • There has been an increase in the number of severe hurricanes (Saffir-Simpson scale 3-5) at a rate of ~ 25-30% per o C of global warming. • There has been an increase in storm surges along Arctic coasts, leading to more frequent inundation of fragile coastal ecosystems. • There have been significant increases in iceberg numbers in the ocean since the 1990s. • There is likely to be an increase in mean global ocean temperature of 1-4o C by 2100. • Due to increased stratification of the ocean, the global Meridional Circulation is likely to decline over the next century, although there is not a consensus as to the rate. • Uncertainty about the future of most large-scale ocean-atmosphere teleconnections under greenhouse warming is ubiquitous.