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AbruptSLR

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #350 on: November 29, 2016, 05:41:18 PM »
It's possible, but there's no direct evidence for it. I think that was the point of Tamino's article. It was perplexing to see a 12-year trend being used in a peer-reviewed paper, especially since we regularly lambast deniers for using such short intervals for spurious claims about global temperature trends. There's not even any evidence for a slowdown in the rate of acceleration.

My post was about a "pause" in the rate of increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere from 2002 to 2014 (due to a presumed increase in CO2 uptake by terrestrial plants); while Tamino's post was about a faux "pause" in the increase in GMSTA.  While the two can be related in a ESM projection, the two issues are different and offset in time by lag.
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #351 on: December 08, 2016, 02:01:10 AM »
The linked article is entitled: "500-year-old clam reveals 'hugely worrying' evidence of climate change and its effects".  This indicates that changes in the ocean may soon accelerate to follow the rapidly changing atmosphere (as the clams indicate happened in the past).


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/climate-change-clam-effects-500-years-old-quahog-global-warming-oceans-atmosphere-cardiff-a7460376.html

Extract: "… since humans started emitting large amounts of greenhouse gases through industrialisation, a switch has taken place and changes in the ocean are now led by the atmosphere, according to the international team of biologists."

See also the linked article is entitled: "What 500-year-old clams can tell us about climate change".

https://theconversation.com/what-500-year-old-clams-can-tell-us-about-climate-change-69926

Extract: "Perhaps one of the most profound aspects of our research is the finding that human-driven climate change, resulting in an overall warming of surface air temperatures, has led to a reversal in the long-term natural coupling of the marine and atmospheric climate systems.
Evidence from the shells shows that over the modern industrial period (AD 1800-2000) changes in marine climate lagged behind the atmosphere. Surface air temperatures responded much faster to human-induced climate changes than the North Atlantic did."
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Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #352 on: December 08, 2016, 06:00:33 AM »
"This study assesses the impact of ocean acidification (OA) on phytoplankton and its synthesis of the climate-active gas dimethylsulfide (DMS), as well as its modulation by two contrasting light regimes in the Arctic. The light regimes tested had significant impact on neither the phytoplankton nor DMS concentration whereas both variables decreased linearly with the decrease in pH. Thus, ocean acidification could significantly decrease the algal biomass and inhibit DMS production in the Arctic."
http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/bg-2016-501/

logicmanPatrick

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #353 on: December 22, 2016, 10:06:53 AM »
Pardon the plug.  ;-)

A bit of carbon cycle science history for anyone who is interested.

Carbon Cycles by Arvid G. Högbom
http://www.science20.com/the_chatter_box/blog/carbon_cycles_by_arvid_g_hoegbom-196827
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #354 on: December 27, 2016, 12:51:30 AM »
The linked article is entitled: "How NASA’s space laser might help save the world".  This research clarifies the substantial risk that polar phytoplankton might absorb less CO₂ with continued global warming:

http://www.ntnews.com.au/technology/how-nasas-space-laser-might-help-save-the-world/news-story/54da1605bf4835687bdb0cd694b38a1d

Extract: "Last week, NASA released a study that culminated a decade’s worth of data and imagery giving new insight into the boom-and-bust cycles of polar phytoplankton — a building block to the entire coastal and oceanic food chain.

The results showed that even the slightest environmental changes in the polar food webs significantly influence the microalgae, which also have another significant impact on the environment with their ability, through photosynthesis, to suck out carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."
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Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #355 on: January 14, 2017, 08:25:02 PM »
 
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v10/n1/full/ngeo2854.html

This abstract is from the nature.com  link above that doesn't seem to properly load.

Coccolithophores—single-celled calcifying phytoplankton—are an important group of marine primary producers and the dominant builders of calcium carbonate globally. Coccolithophores form extensive blooms and increase the density and sinking speed of organic matter via calcium carbonate ballasting.     Thereby, they play a key role in the marine carbon cycle. Coccolithophore physiological responses to experimental ocean acidification have ranged from moderate stimulation to substantial decline in growth and calcification rates, combined with enhanced malformation of their calcite platelets. Here we report on a mesocosm experiment conducted in a Norwegian fjord in which we exposed a natural plankton community to a wide range of CO2-induced ocean acidification, to test whether these physiological responses affect the ecological success of coccolithophore populations. Under high-CO2 treatments, Emiliania huxleyi, the most abundant and productive coccolithophore species, declined in population size during the pre-bloom period and lost the ability to form blooms. As a result, particle sinking velocities declined by up to 30% and sedimented organic matter was reduced by up to 25% relative to controls. There were also strong reductions in seawater concentrations of the climate-active compound dimethylsulfide in CO2-enriched mesocosms. We conclude that ocean acidification can lower calcifying phytoplankton productivity, potentially creating a positive feedback to the climate system.
« Last Edit: January 14, 2017, 08:36:11 PM by Bruce Steele »

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #356 on: January 15, 2017, 05:41:43 AM »
I would like to emphasize the importance of the paper with the failed link above.
Riebesell et al 2016 "Competitive fitness of a predominate pelagic calcified impaired by ocean acidification"

https://news-oceanacidification-icc.org/2016/12/16/a-small-change-with-a-large-impact-mesocosm-experiment-reveals-how-community-interactions-amplify-the-response-of-a-calcifying-phytoplankton-species-to-ocean-acidification/
 
The coccolith in the study is the most important calcifying phytoplankton in the oceans. Although I haven't read the paper in full a 25% reduction in organic carbon ballasted to depth is a very sobering figure. I assume this is based upon projected pCO2 levels for the turn of the century. Pteropods aren't the focus of this study but they are also likely to contribute less towards organic carbon transport due to their susceptibility to lowered pH. So the the # 1 and # 2 oceanic calcifying organisms in the ocean will not be as effective at transporting surface Co2 to depth.
 The sediment carbon sink is about .2 Gt per year and although that doesn't sound like a huge number it is the most effective way to put carbon into a very long term sink. There won't be calcifying phytoplankton or animals to replace the carbon sink contributions of these two organisms, a plant and a mollusk.
 So while the arctic soils contribute an ever increasing amount of carbon to the atmosphere  the oceans will be less capable of absorbing the excess. More Co2 will stay in the atmosphere for longer periods of time.
 

 



 

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #357 on: February 23, 2017, 04:44:50 AM »


https://news-oceanacidification-icc.org/2017/02/22/development-and-application-of-foraminiferal-carbonate-system-proxies-to-quantify-ocean-acidification-in-the-california-current/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wordpress%2FlRgb+%28Ocean+acidification%29

Development and application of foraminiferal carbonate system proxies to quantify ocean acidification in the California Current

The oceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbon has mitigated climate change, but has also resulted in a global average 0.1 decline in surface ocean pH over 20th century known as ocean acidification. The parallel reduction in carbonate ion concentration ([CO32-]) and the saturation state of seawater (Ω) has caused many major calcium carbonate-secreting organisms such as planktonic foraminifera to exhibit impaired calcification. We develop proxy calibrations and down core records that use calcification and geochemical characteristics of planktonic foraminifera as proxies for the marine carbonate system. This study focuses specifically on the surface ocean chemistry of the California Current Ecosystem (CCE), which has been identified as a region of rapidly progressing ocean acidification due to natural upwelling processes and the low buffering capacity of these waters. The calibration portion of this study uses marine sediments collected by the Santa Barbara Basin (SBB), California sediment-trapping program located in the central region of the CCE. We calibrate the relationships of Globigerina bulloides calcification intensity to [CO3 2-] and the B/Ca ratios of G. bulloides, Neogloboquadrina dutertrei and Neogloboquadrina incompta shells to Ω calcite using in situ measurements and model simulations of these independent variables. By applying these proxy methods to down core, our records from the SBB indicate a 20% reduction in foraminiferal calcification since ~1900, translating to a 35% decline in [CO 32-] in the CCE over this period. Our high-resolution calcification record also reveals a substantial interannual to decadal modulation of ocean acidification in the CCE related to the sign of Pacific Decadal Oscillation and El Niño Southern Oscillation. In the future we can expect these climatic modes to both enhance and moderate anthropogenic ocean acidification. Based on our historic record, we predict that if atmospheric CO2 reaches 540 ppm by the year 2100 as predicted by a conservative CO3 pathway, [CO32-] will experience a net reduction of 55%, resulting in at least a 30% reduction in calcification of planktonic foraminifera that will likely be mirrored by other adversely affected marine calcifiers.

Osborne E. B., 2016. Development and application of foraminiferal carbonate system proxies to quantify ocean acidification in the California Current. PhD thesis, University of South Carolina, 182 p. Thesis (restricted access).

Archimid

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #358 on: February 25, 2017, 01:35:18 PM »
Scrutinizing the carbon cycle and CO2 residence time in the atmosphere

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921818116304787

Abstract(my emphasis):
Quote
Climate scientists presume that the carbon cycle has come out of balance due to the increasing anthropogenic emissions from fossil fuel combustion and land use change. This is made responsible for the rapidly increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations over recent years, and it is estimated that the removal of the additional emissions from the atmosphere will take a few hundred thousand years. Since this goes along with an increasing greenhouse effect and a further global warming, a better understanding of the carbon cycle is of great importance for all future climate change predictions. We have critically scrutinized this cycle and present an alternative concept, for which the uptake of CO2 by natural sinks scales proportional with the CO2 concentration. In addition, we consider temperature dependent natural emission and absorption rates, by which the paleoclimatic CO2 variations and the actual CO2 growth rate can well be explained. The anthropogenic contribution to the actual CO2 concentration is found to be 4.3%, its fraction to the CO2 increase over the Industrial Era is 15% and the average residence time 4 years.


I don't have the full article, but it seems to me that another scientist lost his nerve. How can he possibly assume that all carbon sinks will perfectly accommodate the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere? How can all carbon sinks scale linearly with carbon concentration? Magic? Everything I know about the natural world tells me that there are limits to Carbon Sinks and all I know tells me that sinks can certainly become saturated.

Furthermore, meybe it says so in the full article, but how does he account for the historic increase in CO2 from 270 ppm's to the 400ppm's we have now? Magic again? Natural variability? arghh. 
I am an energy reservoir seemingly intent on lowering entropy for self preservation.

logicmanPatrick

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #359 on: February 25, 2017, 04:26:23 PM »

Quote
... How can he possibly assume that all carbon sinks will perfectly accommodate the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere? How can all carbon sinks scale linearly with carbon concentration? Magic?  ...
how does he account for the historic increase in CO2 from 270 ppm's to the 400ppm's we have now? Magic again? Natural variability? arghh.

The author, Hermann Harde, oversimplifies his model of the planetary atmosphere such that feedbacks and delays are, not so much minimised as trivialised.

Please see, e.g. -
    
Dinner with global warming contrarians, disaster for dessert

Consider a Spherical Truncated Icosahedron

Residence Time of Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere

Quote
[Hermann Harde's] claim goes like this:

    (A) Predictions for the Global Warming Potential (GWP) by the IPCC express the warming effect CO2 has over several time scales; 20, 100 and 500 years.
    (B) But CO2 has only a 5 year life time in the atmosphere.
    (C) Therefore CO2 cannot cause the long term warming predicted by the IPCC.

This claim is false. (A) is true. (B) is also true. But B is irrelevant and misleading so it does not follow that C is therefore true.

source: Skeptical Science

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Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #360 on: February 25, 2017, 05:49:48 PM »
I should read logicman links before I comment but I only gave the Herman harder link a cusory look and the graphic offered makes it look like there are no deep sinks or that they are all on some sort of ? 4 year cycle. That is of course ridiculous.
 There are deep sinks. We can date them with radiocarbon from our testing years. We know there are ~38,000 gigatonnes of carbon in the deep oceans . DIC dissolved inorganic carbon.
 Understanding how carbon is delivered into this sink and how carbon is then returned back into the atmosphere is of critical import . Time of circulation is on thousand year timeframes.
 For some further reading about carbon dating and for some more on radiocarbon dating of water masses and the carbon ages associated.

https://www.iaea.org/About/Policy/GC/GC51/GC51InfDocuments/English/gc51inf-3-att3_en.pdf



wili

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #361 on: February 25, 2017, 06:20:16 PM »
Good points, Bruce and Patrick. Those were pretty much my first impressions. I asked about the paper over at RealClimate and this was Gavin Schmidt's response (He's the director of GISS, for those who don't know):

Quote
Oh dear me. Yes, it’s nonsense. But apparently it’s an “Invited” paper? (I’ve never heard of that either). Some questions are going to be raised about the peer review and editorial process here… – gavin]
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #362 on: February 26, 2017, 07:17:57 PM »
Latest pan oceanic oxygen measurements show a 2% drop since the 1960's. In this study they are modeling a 7% decline by 2100 but in the models I inked in the first post on the " carbon cycle " page they projected an 8.6 % drop in the same timeframe.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/02/15/its-official-the-oceans-are-losing-oxygen-posing-growing-threats-to-marine-life/?utm_term=.b8fe6c02da97


wili

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #363 on: February 27, 2017, 07:07:47 AM »
GS has now opened a thread devoted to debunking the Harde study:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2017/02/something-harde-to-believe/#more-20160
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

Laurent

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #364 on: February 28, 2017, 06:38:05 PM »
I have that graph about the residence time of CO2 showing up to 10.000 years remaining CO2 after a pulse. It is not clear to me, is it after a 100 year pulse ? I don't know. I have seen some of that king where you should count on 100.000 years before coming back to normal (but with uncertainties up to million years...).

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #365 on: April 22, 2017, 04:36:18 PM »
Canary in the kelp forest
Published 21 April 2017   Press releases Leave a Comment
The one-two punch of warming waters and ocean acidification is predisposing some marine animals to dissolving quickly under conditions already occurring off the Northern California coast, according to a study from the University of California, Davis.

In the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, researchers at the UC Davis Bodega Marine Laboratory raised bryozoans, also known as “moss animals,” in seawater tanks and exposed them to various levels of water temperature, food and acidity.

The scientists found that when grown in warmer waters and then exposed to acidity, the bryozoans quickly began to dissolve. Large portions of their skeletons disappeared in as little as two months.

“We thought there would be some thinning or reduced mass,” said lead author Dan Swezey, a recent Ph.D. graduate in professor Eric Sanford’s lab at the UC Davis Bodega Marine Laboratory. “But whole features just dissolved practically before our eyes.”


SKELETONS KEY

Bryozoans are colonial animals, superficially similar to, but not related, to corals. They are abundant in California kelp forests and are calcareous, meaning they build their honeycomb-shaped skeletons from calcium carbonate.

The scientists found that when raised under warming conditions, bryozoans altered their chemical composition by building higher levels of magnesium into their skeletons, particularly if they were also eating less food. When exposed to acidic conditions already observed off coastal California, these changes predisposed the animals to dissolve.

The researchers consider bryozoans a canary in the coal mine for other marine animals that build calcareous skeletons containing magnesium. These include sea stars, sea urchins, calcifying algae and tube-building worms.

The authors do not know why the bryozoans added more magnesium to their skeletons under warmer temperatures. But they conclude that marine organisms with skeletons made of high-magnesium calcite may be especially susceptible to ocean acidification because this form of calcium carbonate dissolves more easily than others.

Bryozoans grow in connected colonies. During the experiments, the animals shut down parts of themselves when undergoing the stress of ocean acidification, redirecting their energy to new growth. This was somewhat like closing down units of a condominium complex while building new ones at the same time. But the moss animals could not outpace the dissolution.

“They were trying to grow but were dissolving at the same time,” Swezey said.

CALCIFIED ANIMALS INCREASINGLY VULNERABLE

The authors said the study underlines the increasing vulnerability of calcified animals to ocean acidification, which occurs as the ocean absorbs more atmospheric carbon emitted through the burning of fossil fuels.

During the spring and summer months, deep ocean water rich in carbon dioxide periodically wells up along the California coast when surface waters are pushed offshore by strong winds. These upwelling events also push nutrients to the surface to help support kelp forests and productive fisheries. However, this deep water tends to be more acidic.

Climate modeling shows that the trends of warming ocean temperatures, stronger winds and increasingly strong upwelling events are expected to continue in the coming years as carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere increase. This indicates that acidic conditions will likely become more common, rather than episodic.

MARINE LIFE FACES MANY CHANGES AT ONCE

“Marine life is increasingly faced with many changes at once,” said co-author Sanford, a professor in the UC Davis Department of Evolution and Ecology. “For bryozoans, their response to warmer temperature makes them unexpectedly vulnerable to ocean acidification. The question now is whether other marine species might respond in a similar way.” (…)


Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #366 on: April 22, 2017, 04:52:25 PM »
Here is an old article on ocean acidification. Dr. Andrew Knoll found corals, brachipods, and bryozoan genera well represented in the paleorecord of the end Permian event. They are not physically well suited to rapid changes in ocean chemistry , acidification. History is rewalking a very scary route!

http://www.climos.com/news/articles/sourtimes.htm[/url

It will come from below
 and we will no more know than the trilobites
 our place in it
Brachiopods and bryozoans
 turned to rock
 like before
Cnidarian nightmares
 sulfur, floating fish
It would take a time machine
 to turn this back
And believe me
 It was us
 
A poem I wrote on the subject, I posted it before but somehow seems appropriate . Terry liked it !
« Last Edit: April 22, 2017, 05:09:36 PM by Bruce Steele »

TerryM

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #367 on: April 22, 2017, 07:58:34 PM »
Terry still likes it.


Terry

wili

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #368 on: April 22, 2017, 11:02:37 PM »
As do I! (Though I confess to having to look up 'Cnidarian'!  ::))

Meanwhile,

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/we-just-breached-the-410-parts-per-million-threshold-21372

“We Just Breached the 410 Parts Per Million Threshold”
"A force de chercher de bonnes raisons, on en trouve; on les dit; et après on y tient, non pas tant parce qu'elles sont bonnes que pour ne pas se démentir." Choderlos de Laclos "You struggle to come up with some valid reasons, then cling to them, not because they're good, but just to not back down."

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #369 on: April 23, 2017, 04:01:55 AM »
Thanks Wili and Terry, That line "cnidarian nightmares "rolls off the tongue better with the proper pronunciation of CNIDARIA.  The C is silent.
 https://sesquiotic.wordpress.com/2015/11/28/cnidaria-cnidarian/

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #370 on: April 23, 2017, 07:09:51 AM »
There is the paleorecord and there is current biology and studies on the effects of elevated pCO2 on modern genera. The recent study on dissolution of bryozoans has sent me back into reading work by Andrew Knoll.
From a paper titled "Bio Mineralization and Evolutionary History"
 Permo-Triassic extinction and it's aftermath pages 341-344
   "Catastrophic carbon dioxide increases provides two distinct kill mechanisms - direct physiological inhibition of metabolism and climate change associated with greenhouse enhancement"

http://www.vliz.be/imisdocs/publications/289422.pdf

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #371 on: April 25, 2017, 05:29:56 PM »
Is what we are looking at just one point in a cycle or is this more a reflection of where the nearshore reef ecosystem is headed ? I wonder if the fishermen in Kiribati are sitting in their houses staring out over their bleached dead reefs that have supported them for hundreds of generations wondering the same thing . Will the reefs repair themselves or is there something we as fishermen can do to help repair the damage before the next waves of hot , acidified, diseased water come again ?
 Will enough starfish recover from the densovirus to reassume their role in reef ecology?
Will the abalone hold on until the kelp recovers, will the purple urchin problem resolve itself ? Do we as humans try to intervene or just sit back slack jawed as pieces of the ecosystem die out never to be replaced ? How many people care if the bryozoans dissolve , never to be replaced ? How many people would know a Bryozoa if they were looking at one. Can they have empathy for something they just don't know or is extinction at their hands just one more necessary cost of human progress, greed, and demand for comfort ?
 So a fisherman would tell you , I am sure , that we should try to restore the starfish, kill a bunch of purple urchins by creating a market for them, help restore the kelp beds even if that means moving macrocystis into areas where nereocystis was once dominant .The ocean is heating and species just can't move north fast enough to adapt at a rate that human caused climate change has thrown at them. We are living in a world with atmospheric CO2 levels not seen in millions of years. The heat and acidification caused by this ,in geological terms,instantaneous change is wreaking habitats . Yet humans , humans largely disconnected from nature,somehow think we should just stand aside and let nature recover but any romantic notion of wilderness and the ability of nature to rebuild the world we used to know is continually challenged , crushed, by the rate of change taking place. Humans by a huge majority don't know life in the oceans. Humans will never know the life forms they are shoving into extinction.
 So we fishermen struggling against changes taking place are challenged not only by the scale of the challenge but so to challenged by romantic myths about wilderness and nature perpetuated by people living in shinning cities, flying in their jets, and eating food
grown in distant lands. The advice from these humans is as damaging as the consequences of their lifestyles and consumption habits.
 Rage against the machine and against the dying of the light
 Bruce Steele

https://cdfwmarine.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/perfect-storm-decimates-kelp/
« Last Edit: April 25, 2017, 06:43:16 PM by Bruce Steele »

TerryM

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #372 on: April 27, 2017, 06:03:09 AM »
Beautifully put Bruce


I know nothing of the ocean's diversity, but hope that the fishermen understand that our insensitivity is born of ignorance, not malice. Until I discovered Neven's blog in the winter of 2011 I'd never considered that my way of life could be killing us all. That new years eve I'd stepped out for a cigarette and found to my amazement that the weather was balmy tee shirt weather here in Canada. It took a few false starts until I assured myself that climate change was real, and that what I'd experienced that night was no local anomaly, but a world wide change that probably meant the end of everything I'd known.
Since then I've paid attention to my own transgressions, and tried to alert others to what is surely ahead. I haven't done enough, I haven't done even a fraction of what I could and should do. But, thanks to Neven and his motley crew, I understand.


Terry

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #373 on: April 27, 2017, 09:02:27 AM »
Terry, I have always been an avid science reader. I heard about acidification and read everything I could get my hands on. When I was writing a piece for "National Fisherman" I wanted to quote Andy Knoll. I wanted to get his permission so I got in contact with him. In our brief correspondence I asked him for some advice and he said I should write down the things I saw. I have tried but the story for the very brief Twelve years I have watched is becoming stranger and stranger. I need the support of you and my fellow travelers here on the forum. To be honest even though I copied the little piece  I posted above to several dozen of my fishermen friends I haven't received even one response back from the men I know living their lives in the same ocean I describe. They don't hold me in contempt, some of them are scared like I am , most of them go about their lives and fish and try to adapt to the changes. We don't in our short lives have any context to compare what we are seeing with what life used to be, or how strange our experiance is , or what we should compare it to.
 Tomorrow I will be on a conference call where several fisheries scientists and managers will discuss adaptation strategies to deal with nearshore reef issues tied to problems with climate change. In reality none of us has a lot of confidence in our abilities to manage our way out of this. We hope everything resolves itself , we are nowhere up to the challenges before us. Some problems will resolve themselves I am sure but some pieces of a world we don't understand are slipping away. I will get back into the water , write about the changes taking place and do my damn best to make some kind of difference.
 So if I might repeat myself you are part of my support and I appreciate your concern for our shared predicament.

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #374 on: April 27, 2017, 04:58:05 PM »
When I started diving in California there were seven species of abalone, six of which have almost totally disappeared. The one relatively healthy stock of red abalone is under starvation stress in the areas where it's population was ,until a couple years ago ,the healthiest. Starfish have suffered a major die-off from disease from Mexico into Alaska. Pycnopodia( sunstars ) , a large , fast moving reef predator has been reduced to levels that probably qualify it for listing on the ESA. Their are many other species of starfish also in trouble. There are three species of sea urchins I have seen on a regular basis for my forty year career. Disease is a reaccuring issue for one species, purples, and a couple years ago red urchins started dying. We have sent samples in to pathology labs with no results yet. These are just some of the larger nearshore reef fauna that because of their size we humans make ourselves familiar with. There are probably smaller creatures in trouble we just don't notice. Bryozoans are an example of creatures formerly ubiquitous that can dissolve its skeleton in a couple months exposure to acidified waters, waters currently upwelling in Northern California. Heat and acidification are the stressors but disease seems to be how those stressors manifest themselves. Pteropods and Bryozoans are under dissolution pressures but we don't even know what disease pressures would look like in those species, to small and largely unnoticed.
 Humans didn't even have the ability to dive and accumulate thousands of hours of dive time until one generation before me. Relative to our population numbers very few people can say they have tens of thousands of hours of dive time . Not everyone is a good observer and even some who are are in denial over what is happening. Very few people who have accumulated ten of thousands of dive hours have studied ocean acidification and denial is a problem even with some of them. We humans just aren't psychologically well suited to calmly witnessing wanton destruction of the world around us.
And if you are prescient or show anything like prescient knowledge you can expect major trouble from your fellow humans.
 Climate change, heat and acidification are killers among us. Much of what is going to happen ,what is already beginning to happen around us , can be foreseen. Denial is just another killer and it is just as deadly in the long run of things. Stand witness my friends , write ,tell us what you see from your place in the world.
 My wife's favorite line from " Out of Africa " is " God made the world round so we wouldn't ever be able to see too far down the road "
 We have satellites now



oren

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #375 on: April 28, 2017, 12:03:02 PM »
Bruce, you write beautifully on a very sad subject. I hope things recover somehow, though in the grand scheme of things we are all, indeed, screwed.

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #376 on: April 28, 2017, 07:27:58 PM »
Bruce, do you know Jeremy Jackson (not of Baywatch fame but) from the Scripps institute?
He's an elderly oceanographer who since many years gives talks about the ruin of the oceans he has witnessed over his lifetime. It is the most depressing and enraging stuff about the state of the planet I've seen...
https://www.ted.com/talks/jeremy_jackson

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #377 on: April 28, 2017, 11:25:23 PM »
Martin, Of course I know who he is but Jeremy paints with a very broad brush that includes me. I am a fisherman and to me Jeremy chooses to create monsters to slay. I am no monster...or more accurately everyone is. I can accept I am nowhere near perfect but scapegoating fishermen for All the ills befalling the oceans will never fix ocean heating, acidification or invasive species problems. We are all culpable and we all need to take responsibility .
 If you look through the local California problems I described in my recent posts very few of them can be attributed to fishing. We don't have issues with overfishing , we have closed over twenty five percent of our state fishing grounds to all fishing and we have some damned serious problems that won't go away even if you get rid of every fisherman left.
 There are people that are willing to listen to a fisherman , people who might not listen to a scientist.
I will be here , I will try to describe what I see , I will accept my failures and try to remedy them.

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #378 on: April 28, 2017, 11:36:23 PM »
I will be here , I will try to describe what I see , I will accept my failures and try to remedy them.

Quote
    "I live for being wrong," said Lajoie. "That's where we learn."
Yep. What more a human can do ?


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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #379 on: April 29, 2017, 12:23:47 AM »
Bruce
I can empathize. I was in commercial refrigeration when we were targeted for destroying the Ozone layer.


That said, surely we need more regulation, not less. What happens to California's fisheries under the next Governor Reagan, operating under the rheumy eyed oversight of the next President Trump? As far as I know Monterrey sardines fed generations, until the limits were lifted to feed the troops. We could need protein supplements for large armies in the near future, and trolling for the last Halibut might be expedient.
 
Globally has the bulk of the damage been done by unregulated fishing, or pollution, or global warming? I don't know the answer, but I do believe that unregulated fishing is among the big three.
Looking forward we can be assured that global warming & the accompanying acidification will only get worse. Doesn't it make sense to increase regulation of fisheries as well as pollution sources?


Terry

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #380 on: April 29, 2017, 01:51:36 AM »
Terry, There are success stories for fish management and plenty of stories about stock collapse sometimes due to excess , greed and familiar human shortcomings. Do we acknowledge success when we have examples and hold those examples up for others to follow or do we retrace our failings with race relations, nationalism, and exceptionalizm? i.e. Polarization .There are fishermen who have helped manage themselves and protect the fish stocks that keep them in business. The "failure of the commons "is not universal and groups of humans willing to do the right thing, manage themselves and to a large degree self enforce their common good over their individual interests do exist. The common good and self interest are not mutually exclusive but there does ,as a rule ,always seem to be some element willing to break the common trust and sometimes we sink their boats.
 Although overfishing probably did contribute to the story about the collapse of the Monterey sardine fishery it also coincided with a PDO flip in ~ 1945. Many of the problems for California fisheries I have
been describing are driven by forces largely beyond our ( fishermens) control but yes as the environment deteriorates we have little option but to restrict fishing efforts.
 As a rule I have always strived to put the resource first and put economics as an important factor but not one that ever superceeds the importance of the resource. Keeping your priorities straight helps when  others ,or groups of other ,decide to challenge necessary controls.
 The difficult decisions I am talking about might serve as some sort of template for governance of terrestrial resources but the larger the group of humans you are trying to manage the more it seems money and power begin to erode these ideals. I just don't think concepts like the "failure of the commons "are things we should embrace like universal truths. We need sometimes to show a little faith in other people's good intentions, and sink boats when we have to.

I guess it's " the tragedy of the commons " ... Wrong either way
« Last Edit: April 29, 2017, 02:00:14 AM by Bruce Steele »

TerryM

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #381 on: April 29, 2017, 03:35:20 AM »
Thanks Bruce
For some inexplicable reason I'd never considered over fishing as an example of a tragedy of the commons problem. It is of course, just that it's something I'd never considered.
In Newfoundland they had very harsh words for Chinese factory ships that they claimed were working just outside the line, then selling their cheap frozen produce in local marts.


A giant, foreign, factory ship will probably always seen as "the other". Do the captains of these vessels see themselves as responsible custodians of limited resources, or as pirates with little thought for the well being of the local fish stocks, since they'll move on when the fish are gone?


It seems almost as if the village commons is being destroyed by migrant herdsmen, free to choose another route in another year. 

edit:
This reads as if I'm blaming everthing on the fishery. Centainly not my understanding or intent.

Terry

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #382 on: May 11, 2017, 06:12:15 AM »
New study of Amazon river CO2 emissions shows that biosphere does not take up as much CO2 as once thought.

https://phys.org/news/2017-05-amazon-river-carbon-dioxide-emissions.html

Study finds Amazon River carbon dioxide emissions nearly balance terrestrial uptake
Quote
The results increase the most recent global estimates of CO2 emissions from rivers and lakes by almost 50%, with potentially huge implications for global climate policy

Paper here:  Henrique O. Sawakuchi et al, Carbon Dioxide Emissions along the Lower Amazon River, Frontiers in Marine Science (2017)
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2017.00076
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My "burning embers"
are not tri-color bar graphs
+3C today

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #383 on: May 26, 2017, 05:42:39 PM »
For the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, scientists raised foraminifera -- single-celled organisms about the size of a grain of sand -- at the UC Davis Bodega Marine Laboratory under future, high CO2 conditions.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/05/170525161326.htm

These tiny organisms, commonly called "forams," are ubiquitous in marine environments and play a key role in food webs and the ocean carbon cycle.

Stressed Under Future Conditions

After exposing them to a range of acidity levels, UC Davis scientists found that under high CO2, or more acidic, conditions, the foraminifera had trouble building their shells and making spines, an important feature of their shells.

They also showed signs of physiological stress, reducing their metabolism and slowing their respiration to undetectable levels.

This is the first study of its kind to show the combined impact of shell building, spine repair, and physiological stress in foraminifera under high CO2 conditions. The study suggests that stressed and impaired foraminifera could indicate a larger scale disruption of carbon cycling in the ocean.

Off Balance

As a marine calcifier, foraminifera use calcium carbonate to build their shells, a process that plays an integral part in balancing the carbon cycle.

Normally, healthy foraminifera calcify their shells and sink to the ocean floor after they die, taking the calcite with them. This moves alkalinity, which helps neutralize acidity, to the seafloor.

When foraminifera calcify less, their ability to neutralize acidity also lessens, making the deep ocean more acidic.

But what happens in the deep ocean doesn't stay in the deep ocean.

Impacts for Thousands of Years

"It's not out-of-sight, out-of-mind," said lead author Catherine Davis, a Ph.D. student at UC Davis during the study and currently a postdoctoral associate at the University of South Carolina. "That acidified water from the deep will rise again. If we do something that acidifies the deep ocean, that affects atmospheric and ocean carbon dioxide concentrations on time scales of thousands of years."

Davis said the geologic record shows that such imbalances have occurred in the world's oceans before, but only during times of major change.

"This points to one of the longer time-scale effects of anthropogenic climate change that we don't understand yet," Davis said.

Upwelling Brings 'Future' to Surface

One way acidified water returns to the surface is through upwelling, when strong winds periodically push nutrient-rich water from the deep ocean up to the surface. Upwelling supports some of the planet's most productive fisheries and ecosystems. But additional anthropogenic, or human-caused, CO2 in the system is expected to impact fisheries and coastal ecosystems.

UC Davis' Bodega Marine Laboratory in Northern California is near one of the world's most intense coastal upwelling areas. At times, it experiences conditions most of the ocean isn't expected to experience for decades or hundreds of years.

"Seasonal upwelling means that we have an opportunity to study organisms in high CO2, acidic waters today -- a window into how the ocean may look more often in the future," said co-author Tessa Hill, an associate professor in earth and planetary sciences at UC Davis. "We might have expected that a species of foraminifera well-adapted to Northern California wouldn't respond negatively to high CO2 conditions, but that expectation was wrong. This study provides insight into how an important marine calcifier may respond to future conditions, and send ripple effects through food webs and carbon cycling."

AbruptSLR

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #384 on: June 09, 2017, 05:06:38 PM »
I don't know much about ocean acidification, but these hotspots in the North Pacific look troublesome.

"West Coast Waters on Acid Trip; Fishing Industry in Peril"

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/ocean-acidification-hotspots-west-coast-21517


Extract: "Hotspots of ocean acidification have been found in the waters that wash onto the shores of the West Coast, a major concern for the region’s billion dollar fishing industry as well as the region’s potentially fragile coastal ecosystems.

A new study of a 600-mile span of coastline found some of the lowest pH levels ever measured on the ocean surface, showing that significant acidification can be found in waters right along the shore."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
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Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #385 on: June 10, 2017, 04:59:25 AM »
ASLR, We are seeing some of the lowest surface water pH readings here along the US West Coast.
We are seeing these readings in the same places in multiple years of upwelling seasons. Offshore winds and upwelling draw up low pH intermediate waters and deliver them onto the shelf. Riverine waters also dump additional nutrients that along with the nutrients produced in upwelling processes result in phytoplankton blooms that add to the low pH conditions when they die, sink and are remineralized by bacteria. This also results in low oxygen levels that co-occur with the extremely low pH events.
 A place called Fogarty Creek Oregon, close to Depoe Bay, has recorded the lowest readings at 7.43pH The long shore current takes the nutrient enriched waters from the Columbia River combines them with the upwelled intermediate water and sends them at the coast as it wraps around offshore reefs like the Stonewall bank.
 These conditions will continue to worsen because the intermediate waters feeding these upwelling areas are about 35 years old and the waters that will be delivered for the next 30 to 40 years are already in the pipeline and as atmospheric CO2 levels increase so too will the future waters delivered be more acidified than the waters currently upwelling that were formed 35 years ago.
 Mean DIC ( anthro ) in intermediate waters is ~ 37 umol per kg-1 that was in formation when atmospheric CO2 was ~ 350 ppm
 Intermediate waters currently in formation with current 400 ppm will arrive with DIC( anthro ) at ~ 56
 umol per kg-1. "When this water reaches the CCLME , the frequency of omega < 1.7 events at the CM site ( 40.34degrees north) in Northern California will rise to 61%, an 81% increase from current exposure and 14.5 fold increase over pre-industrial estimates." Omega <1.7 is the point where biological damage begins in sensitive shellfish.
 CCLME is the California curent large marine ecosystem. CM is Cape Mendocino
 The paper is open access

http://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-02777-y
     
« Last Edit: June 10, 2017, 09:32:36 AM by Bruce Steele »

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #386 on: June 13, 2017, 03:02:04 PM »
ASLR, We are seeing some of the lowest surface water pH readings here along the US West Coast.

Bruce, thanks for the information.  It makes me concerned about the oceans off the western coast of South America (which also has upwelling with the potential for phytoplankton blooms).

Best,
ASLR
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #387 on: June 18, 2017, 11:25:47 PM »
ASLR, Although the Humboldt Current that flows along the  coast of Chile is also an eastern boundary
current instrument readings in high upwelling regions of Central Chile record pCO2 peaking at slightly less than DIC =1,800. This hasn't resulted in surface water understaturation yet.
http://c-can.info/2017/03/20/species-specific-responses-to-ocean-acidification-should-account-for-local-adaptation-and-adaptive-plasticity/
 pCO2 readings in upwelling regions off the Oregon Coast are exceeding DIC=2190 pH < 7.75 and omega( undersaturation ) < 1.0
The most recent Oregon Coast  readings of pH < 7.43 push omega quite a bit below aragonite saturation. Other Eastern boundary currents will catch up but we are seeing more extreme conditions here and can expect those conditions to further deteriorate.

https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel3087/feel3087.shtml
« Last Edit: June 18, 2017, 11:31:59 PM by Bruce Steele »

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #388 on: July 11, 2017, 01:25:36 AM »
I don't think I need to comment on this new paper on pteropods in the Calif. Current, the language is very clear. The acidification we can expect over the next 30 years is baked in the cake at this point but there will be decades and decades of increasing acidification beyond the 30 years of acidification already in the pipe even if we do manage to begin to reduce our CO2 emissions .

xposure history determines pteropod vulnerability to ocean acidification along the US West Coast

N. Bednaršek1,2, R. A. Feely1, N. Tolimieri3, A. J. Hermann1,4, S. A. Siedlecki 4, G. G. Waldbusser 5, P. McElhany3, S. R. Alin1, T. Klinger6, B. Moore-Maley7 & H. O. Pörtner 8

Abstract
The pteropod Limacina helicina frequently experiences seasonal exposure to corrosive conditions
(Ωar < 1) along the US West Coast and is recognized as one of the species most susceptible to ocean acidification (OA). Yet, little is known about their capacity to acclimatize to such conditions. We collected pteropods in the California Current Ecosystem (CCE) that differed in the severity of exposure to Ωar conditions in the natural environment. Combining field observations, high-CO2 perturbation experiment results, and retrospective ocean transport simulations, we investigated biological responses based on histories of magnitude and duration of exposure to Ωar < 1. Our results suggest that both exposure magnitude and duration affect pteropod responses in the natural environment. However, observed declines in calcification performance and survival probability under high CO2 experimental conditions do not show acclimatization capacity or physiological tolerance related to history of exposure to corrosive conditions. Pteropods from the coastal CCE appear to be at or near the limit of their physiological capacity, and consequently, are already at extinction risk under projected acceleration of OA over the next 30 years. Our results demonstrate that Ωar exposure history largely determines pteropod response to experimental conditions and is essential to the interpretation of biological observations and experimental results.


Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #389 on: July 17, 2017, 05:37:36 PM »
Here is an open access link to the pteropods paper above.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-03934-z

The important points IMO are
Inability to acclimate , feed availability doesn't compensate for undersaturation stress, undersaturation stress can cause mortality even if pteropods are returned to saturated water conditions, results may explain decrease in pteropods numbers in the northern Calif. Current, predicted undersaturation over a much larger portion of the pteropods range in the Calif. Current in the next thirty years will likely affect pteropods population and carbon cycle contributions

Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #390 on: July 22, 2017, 07:40:31 PM »
Forward:

This thesis shows that purple urchins increase feeding rates by about 500% when exposed to acidified conditions that are currently occurring in Northern California during spring upwelling season. (see figure 8 below)

http://broncoscholar.library.cpp.edu/bitstream/handle/10211.3/194019/BriggsLauren_Thesis2017.pdf?sequence=4
No wonder the kelp is all gone! Of course 150 purples per square meter can do plenty of damage without an increased  feeding rate. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife documented purples in those concentrations across their abalone survey transects.  (See https://cdfwmarine.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/perfect-storm-decimates-kelp/)

TerryM

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #391 on: July 23, 2017, 12:46:51 PM »
That was one sick looking abalone!
Probably of no interest commercially, but what will the effect be on the sea otter population? It seems as though they just start rebounding from the fur trade, and somebody eats their kelp forests. I've always considered them as special.
Terry

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #392 on: July 25, 2017, 02:40:36 AM »
Terry, What will happen to sea otters is an open question. Their numbers have been going up for several decades and are approaching levels that could be sufficient for delisting. Too many purple urchins and not enough kelp would likely restrict sea otter diets for other herbivores dependent upon healthy kelp. There are some studies that show increased kelp and
associated  small crustacea and mollusks in CO2 vent areas so maybe conditions for otters would be OK but these studies aren't from areas within sea otters historical range.
 Sea Otter politics is a difficult terrain for a Sea Urchin diver. I have a long history in that arena and I guess the best compliment I ever got from all those years was from an environmental proponent who said I was a worthy opponent. I f you'd like to see some old history on the subject google my name plus Sea Otters.
 Otters, acidification, fisheries management and water politics are all tough political terrain. That is where I spend my time and energy.

TerryM

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #393 on: July 25, 2017, 05:00:31 PM »
Bruce
Sorry I touched on such a sensitive subject.


Abalone is my 2nd favorite sea food, uni is also on that list, but I have to confess to a love for the furry little buggers that apparently decimate the other two.
Your efforts on behalf of the shellfish appear to have been heroic over an extended period. FWIW I'll advise all in earshot that increasing the sea otter's territory might not be such a wonderful goal, should the subject ever arise.


Unfortunately, as the kelp forests keep disappearing, and ocean acidification intensifies, it may be totally out of our hands.


Terry

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #394 on: July 25, 2017, 06:06:44 PM »
Terry, If ever the day comes that sea otters can't survive because of what we have done to their enviornment then I believe we will have also destroyed habitability for ourselves here on land .
I wish them no ill will and have gained ,over the years ,respect for them. I am merely a visitor to their world .  The ocean is an amazing place I have been privileged to spend so many years. Acidification scares me. People scare me.     The sirens still call.

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #395 on: August 01, 2017, 10:03:57 PM »
There is a paper out by Them and Gill

DOI:10.1038/s41598-017-05307-y

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-05307-y

about the Toarcian hothouse about 180 Myr ago.  Osmium isotope ratios indicate enhanced weathering drawing down atmospheric CO2 but also causing anoxic ocean events. This research ties into the Kidder-Worsley picture of hothouse events which I have referred to previously, see for example doi: 10.1130/G131A.1

Nice paper. Open access. Read all about it.

sidd



Bruce Steele

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #396 on: August 11, 2017, 04:53:39 PM »
Here is a paper about carbon fluxes in the area of the MacKenzie Shelf. It contains data collected from three buoy arrays monitored in the 2014 melt season. Temperatures at surface and at depth, current direction and velocity, DIC, and pCO2. 29 pages with lots of informative info relevant to late season melt and carbon transport in the Southern Beaufort.

https://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/bg-2017-318/bg-2017-318.pdf

Abstract. The Mackenzie Shelf in the southeastern Beaufort Sea is a region that has experienced large changes in the past several decades as warming, sea-ice loss, and increased river discharge have altered carbon cycling. Upwelling and downwelling events are common on the shelf, caused by strong, fluctuating along-shore winds, resulting in cross-shelf Ekman transport, and an alternating estuarine and anti-estuarine circulation. Downwelling carries inorganic carbon and other remineralization products off the shelf and into the deep basin for possible long-term storage in the world oceans. Upwelling carries dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) and nutrient-rich waters from the Pacific-origin upper halocline layer (UHL) onto the shelf. Profiles of DIC and total alkalinity (TA) taken in August and September of 2014 are used to investigate the cycling of inorganic carbon on the Mackenzie Shelf. The along-shore transport of water and the cross-shelf transport of inorganic carbon are quantified using velocity field output from a simulation of the Arctic and Northern Hemisphere Atlantic (ANHA4) configuration of the Nucleus of European Modelling of the Ocean (NEMO) framework. A strong upwelling event prior to sampling on the Mackenzie Shelf is analyzed and the resulting influence on the carbonate system, including the saturation state of waters with respect to aragonite and pH, is investigated. TA and the oxygen isotope ratio of water (δ18O) are used to examine water-mass distributions in the study area and to investigate the influence of Pacific Water, Mackenzie River freshwater, and sea-ice melt on carbon dynamics and air-sea fluxes of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the surface mixed layer. Understanding carbon transfer in this seasonally dynamic environment is key to quantify the importance of Arctic shelf regions to the global carbon cycle and provide a basis for understanding how it will respond to the aforementioned climate-induced changes.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2017, 04:59:26 PM by Bruce Steele »

logicmanPatrick

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #397 on: September 02, 2017, 04:25:03 PM »
Thanks Wili and Terry, That line "cnidarian nightmares "rolls off the tongue better with the proper pronunciation of CNIDARIA.  The C is silent.
 https://sesquiotic.wordpress.com/2015/11/28/cnidaria-cnidarian/

Just caught up with your post.

A haiku

The sea is warm
death of cnidaria
the C is silent.
si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes

AbruptSLR

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #398 on: September 14, 2017, 04:18:12 PM »
The linked reference's findings that methane emissions from boreal wetlands and that the area of tropical wetlands is decreasing is not comforting:

Benjamin Poulter, Philippe Bousquet, Josep G Canadell, Philippe Ciais & Anna Peregon (2017), "Global wetland contribution to 2000–2012 atmospheric methane growth rate dynamics", Environmental Research Letters, Volume 12, Number 9, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa8391

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aa8391/meta;jsessionid=3D6FF28E9F0A87ED717E47D4AB7BA992.ip-10-40-2-120

Abstract: "Increasing atmospheric methane (CH4) concentrations have contributed to approximately 20% of anthropogenic climate change. Despite the importance of CH4 as a greenhouse gas, its atmospheric growth rate and dynamics over the past two decades, which include a stabilization period (1999–2006), followed by renewed growth starting in 2007, remain poorly understood. We provide an updated estimate of CH4 emissions from wetlands, the largest natural global CH4 source, for 2000–2012 using an ensemble of biogeochemical models constrained with remote sensing surface inundation and inventory-based wetland area data. Between 2000–2012, boreal wetland CH4 emissions increased by 1.2 Tg yr−1 (−0.2–3.5 Tg yr−1), tropical emissions decreased by 0.9 Tg yr−1 (−3.2−1.1 Tg yr−1), yet globally, emissions remained unchanged at 184 ± 22 Tg yr−1. Changing air temperature was responsible for increasing high-latitude emissions whereas declines in low-latitude wetland area decreased tropical emissions; both dynamics are consistent with features of predicted centennial-scale climate change impacts on wetland CH4 emissions. Despite uncertainties in wetland area mapping, our study shows that global wetland CH4 emissions have not contributed significantly to the period of renewed atmospheric CH4 growth, and is consistent with findings from studies that indicate some combination of increasing fossil fuel and agriculture-related CH4 emissions, and a decrease in the atmospheric oxidative sink."
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jai mitchell

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Re: Carbon Cycle
« Reply #399 on: September 14, 2017, 05:18:44 PM »
The linked reference shows that CO2 emissions from boreal lakes has been severely underestimated, this study doubles the rate of CO2 from boreal lakes.  The increase of surface area of boreal lakes is a primary feature of arctic amplification vis-a-vis permafrost melt.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gcb.13902/abstract?campaign=wolacceptedarticle

CO2 evasion from boreal lakes: revised estimate, drivers of spatial variability, and future projections

Abstract

Lakes (including reservoirs) are an important component of the global carbon (C) cycle, as acknowledged by the 5th assessment report of the IPCC. In the context of lakes, the boreal region is disproportionately important contributing to 27% of the worldwide lake area, despite representing just 14% of global land surface area. In this study, we used a statistical approach to derive a prediction equation for the partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) in lakes as a function of lake area, terrestrial net primary productivity (NPP) and precipitation (r2 = 0.56), and to create the first high resolution, circumboreal map (0.5) of lake pCO2. The map of pCO2 was combined with lake area from the recently published GLOWABO database and three different estimates of the gas transfer velocity k to produce a resulting map of CO2 evasion (FCO2). For the boreal region we estimate an average, lake area weighted,pCO2 of 966 (678- 1325) μatm and a total FCO2 of 189 (74-347) Tg C yr−1, and evaluate the corresponding uncertainties based on Monte Carlo simulation. Our estimate of FCO2 is approximately twofold greater than previous estimates, as a result of methodological and data source differences. We use our results along with published estimates of the other C fluxes through inland waters to derive a C budget for the boreal region, and find that FCO2 from lakes is the most significant flux of the land-ocean aquatic continuum, and of a similar magnitude as emissions from forest fires. Using the model and applying it to spatially resolved projections of terrestrial NPP and precipitation while keeping everything else constant, we predict a 107% increase in boreal lake FCO2 under emission scenario RCP8.5 by 2100. Our projections are largely driven by increases in terrestrial NPP over the same period, showing the very close connection between the terrestrial and aquatic C cycle.
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