Carbon Cycle

[Bruce Steele]

Here is a model which gives future temps., pH, and productivity for the earths large water masses. In discussions you can download the full article.
 

Multiple stressors of ocean ecosystems in the 21st century: projections with CMIP5 models
Posted: 28 Feb 2013 12:44 AM PST
Ocean ecosystems are increasingly stressed by human-induced changes of their physical, chemical and biological environment. Among these changes, warming, acidification, deoxygenation and changes in primary productivity by marine phytoplankton can be considered as four of the major stressors of open ocean ecosystems. Due to rising atmospheric CO2 in the coming decades, these changes will be amplified. Here, we use the most recent simulations performed in the framework of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 to assess how these stressors may evolve over the course of the 21st century. The 10 Earth System Models used here project similar trends in ocean warming, acidification, deoxygenation and reduced primary productivity for each of the IPCC’s representative concentration parthways (RCP) over the 21st century. For the “business-as-usual” scenario RCP8.5, the model-mean changes in 2090s (compared to 1990s) for sea surface temperature, sea surface pH, global O2 content and integrated primary productivity amount to +2.73 °C, −0.33 pH unit, −3.45% and −8.6%, respectively. For the high mitigation scenario RCP2.6, corresponding changes are +0.71 °C, −0.07 pH unit, −1.81% and −2.0% respectively, illustrating the effectiveness of extreme mitigation strategies. Although these stressors operate globally, they display distinct regional patterns. Large decreases in O2 and in pH are simulated in global ocean intermediate and mode waters, whereas large reductions in primary production are simulated in the tropics and in the North Atlantic. Although temperature and pH projections are robust across models, the same does not hold for projections of sub-surface O2 concentrations in the tropics and global and regional changes in net primary productivity.


Bopp L., Resplandy L., Orr J. C., Doney S. C., Dunne J. P., Gehlen M., Halloran P., Heinze C., Ilyina T., Séférian R., Tjiputra J. & Vichi M., 2013. Multiple stressors of ocean ecosystems in the 21st century: projections with CMIP5 models. Biogeosciences Discussions 10: 3627-3676. Article.


 Also includes O2.  Many of these trends are stressors to biological communities and they also have synergistic effects , one stressor compounding another.

[gfwellman]

For the “business-as-usual” scenario RCP8.5, the model-mean changes in 2090s (compared to 1990s) for sea surface temperature, sea surface pH, global O2 content and integrated primary productivity amount to +2.73 °C, −0.33 pH unit, −3.45% and −8.6%, respectively.

Ok, tell me I'm not the only one for whom those numbers are a "Holy ---k" moment.  Not the first one - actually it's less alarming than many projections.  But the others ... kiss seafood goodbye, prepare for war over food produced on land, and wheeze like an asthmatic while fighting for that food.

[ritter]

For the “business-as-usual” scenario RCP8.5, the model-mean changes in 2090s (compared to 1990s) for sea surface temperature, sea surface pH, global O2 content and integrated primary productivity amount to +2.73 °C, −0.33 pH unit, −3.45% and −8.6%, respectively.

Ok, tell me I'm not the only one for whom those numbers are a "Holy ---k" moment.  Not the first one - actually it's less alarming than many projections.  But the others ... kiss seafood goodbye, prepare for war over food produced on land, and wheeze like an asthmatic while fighting for that food.

Just one more bit of evidence that business as usual can not continue if we wish to leave a home for our children.

[Bruce Steele]

GFWellman, The projections are for what happens if we hit  900 -1000 ppm Co2. The transfer of atmospheric Co2 into the oceans is a chemical reaction but the transfer of that Co2( carbonic acid ) into the ocean depths is dependent on biological processes. The decrease in primary productivity also effects the transfer of Co2 into the deep ocean sink. The oceans are the ultimate destination for most of the Co2 we produce. They will continue to acidify for 200 to three hundred years should we make the mistake of proceeding on the BAU path. 

[gfwellman]

Actually, I misread that abstract (or read it too quickly).  I thought the O2 was atmospheric - which in retrospect I should've realized I was misunderstanding.  So it's still a pretty grim picture but not what I was thinking.  Very grim for anyone who gets most of their protein from the sea - which a quick google suggests is about 1 billion people.

[Bruce Steele]

http://dx.doi.org/10.5194/bgd-10-3627-2013               Hopefully this will link to full discussion paper in biogeoscience.

[StuartC]

If it helps, there's a direct link to download the paper as pdf here:

http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/10/3627/2013/bgd-10-3627-2013.pdf

[Edheler]

That is a pretty scary paper. Thanks for the link!

[Lynn Shwadchuck]

Yes, thanks for that paper. Very scary charts. I assume everyone here saw this 2009 lecture on the state of the oceans with regard to seafood production. After that I pretty much won't touch fish. The decreases in population have been fudged for decades. Mostly over-fishing, but these global warming related effects are just polishing them off.

[Lynn Shwadchuck]

Did I break a rule by embedding that video?

[gfwellman]

Nope.  There's a thread where "how to embed a video" was worked out.  :-)

[Bruce Steele]

Here's an old piece http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/kwing/media/Steele_OceanAcidification.pdf         I wrote for National Fishermen five years ago. I am a fisherman and climate campaigner. The California Current is more acidified than world  ocean averages due largely to upwelling of north pacific intermediate waters. As the Bopp et al paper says intermediate waters are acidifying rapidly. NPIntermediate waters form as the cold Oyashio current mixes with the warm salty Kuroshio current. The water sinks and carries organic matter to depths >500 meters where bacteria consume and remineralize it. 35 to 50 years after the waters left the surface they upwell with dissolved Co2 doubled to about 800 ppm here on the west coast of north America .   Fall freeze up of sea ice drives cold salty water to depth.  So if at some point the sea ice fails to form so too the downwelling will weaken or fail.   The freeze-up hasn't failed yet and the 8.6% decrease in primary productivity projected for 2100 Bopp et al  is still a ways into the future. The  oceans in my opinion are not dying and fish stocks locally are not in bad shape. If we don't burn the  remaining proven carbon reserves we have a chance to avoid the worst.           

[Bruce Steele]

Ocean acidification
 
Ocean acidification
Ocean acidification (video)
Impacts of ocean acidification on marine organisms: quantifying sensitivities and interaction with warming
Acid test: threat to oceans may also harm Great Lakes
Ocean acidification seminar to open Maine Fishermen’s Forum this Thursday, February 28
Effects of ocean acidification, temperature and nutrient regimes on the appendicularian Oikopleura dioica: a mesocosm study
Ocean acidification
Posted: 27 Feb 2013 05:11 AM PST
The oceans play a central role in the maintenance of life on Earth. Oceans provide extensive ecosystems for marine animals and plants covering two-thirds of the Earth’s surface, are essential sources of food, economic activity, and biodiversity, and are central to the global biogeochemical cycles. The oceans are the largest reservoir of carbon in the Planet, and absorb approximately one-third of the carbon emissions that are released to the Earth’s atmosphere as a result of human activities. Since the beginning of industrialization, humans have been responsible for the increase in one greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide (CO2), from approximately 280 parts per million (ppm) at the end of the nineteenth century to the current levels of 390ppm. As well as affecting the surface ocean pH, and the organisms living at the ocean surface, these increases in CO2 are causing global mean surface temperatures to rise.


Iglesias-Rodriguez M. D., 2013. Ocean acidification. In: Orcutt J. (ed.), Earth System Monitoring, pp 269-289. New York: Springer. Book chapter (subscription required).


 
 

Ocean acidification (video)
Posted: 27 Feb 2013 02:50 AM PST



California Academy of Sciences, Science Today, 25 February 2013. Video.


 
 

Impacts of ocean acidification on marine organisms: quantifying sensitivities and interaction with warming
Posted: 26 Feb 2013 09:14 AM PST
Ocean acidification represents a threat to marine species worldwide, and forecasting the ecological impacts of acidification is a high priority for science, management, and policy. As research on the topic expands at an exponential rate, a comprehensive understanding of the variability in organisms’ responses and corresponding levels of certainty is necessary to forecast the ecological effects. Here, we perform the most comprehensive meta-analysis to date by synthesizing the results of 228 studies examining biological responses to ocean acidification. The results reveal decreased survival, calcification, growth, development and abundance in response to acidification when the broad range of marine organisms is pooled together. However, the magnitude of these responses varies among taxonomic groups, suggesting there is some predictable trait-based variation in sensitivity despite the investigation of approximately 100 new species in recent research. The results also reveal an enhanced sensitivity of mollusc larvae, but suggest that an enhanced sensitivity of early life history stages is not universal across all taxonomic groups. In addition, the variability in species’ responses is enhanced when they are exposed to acidification in multi-species assemblages, suggesting it is important to consider indirect effects and exercise caution when forecasting abundance patterns from single species laboratory experiments. Furthermore, the results suggest that other factors, such as nutritional status or source population, could cause substantial variation in organisms’ responses. Last, the results highlight a trend towards enhanced sensitivity to acidification when taxa are concurrently exposed to elevated seawater temperature.


Kroeker K. J., Kordas R. L., Crim R., Hendriks I. E., Ramajo L., Singh G. S., Duarte C. M. & Gattuso J.-P., in press. Impacts of ocean acidification on marine organisms: quantifying sensitivities and interaction with warming. Global Change Biology. Article                                                                            A much newer synopsis of biological response based on results of many different species, and additional stressors.

[Bruce Steele]

AbruptSLR, I have a concern about the decrease in Antarctic bottom water formation and the associated effects on the carbon cycle. Atlantic deep water formation is responsible for about 50% of the carbon transport to the depths and the other half is delivered by Antarctic deep water formation. The approximate lifespan of these waters is 1000 years before they are upwelled back to the surface in the eastern equatorial pacific. If the rate of Antarctic deep water formation has been reduced 60% then there must be an associated reduction in the carbon pump. Do you know of any papers which attempt to quantify effects of the ADW formation on the carbon cycle ?  It goes without saying that either a decrease in primary productivity or a slowdown in deep water formation would result in more Co2 accumulating in  surface waters and the atmosphere. This is a positive feedback which I haven't seen adequately described but the lifespan of these drivers would span tens of thousands of years. I have an interest in how AGW plays out in biological terms which means trying to understand bacterial remineralization, viruses, yeasts and carbonate chemistry. Thanks in advance for any insight you can   lend.       I reposted this query to AbruptSLR because any changes in deep water formation will have large and longterm feedbacks on the carbon pump.  A 60% drop in Antarctic deep water formation is another one of those jaw dropping figures that makes my head spin.   

[Bruce Steele]

I made a mistake in my last post. Although a large percentage of anthropogenic Co2 is subducted in Atlantic Deep Water formation, in the Antarctic anthropogenic Co2 leaves the surface in Antarctic Intermediate Water formation processes.   See Sabine et al 2004.      On a time scale of thousands of years it is estimated 90% of anthropogenic Co2 emissions will end up in the oceans. Archer et al. 1998.   Most of our Co2 legacy will end up in the deep oceans but due to slow mixing of water masses other than Atlantic Deep water ,it will take a long time to get there.

[Bruce Steele]

As stated in the first carbon cycle post, warming, acidification, deoxygenation and changes in primary productivity are the major stressors of open-ocean ecosystems.  Ocean warming is driven by atmospheric temperature increases, acidification by increasing CO2, deoxygenation by stratification and bacterial remineralization of organic matter.  Salinity changes also affect calcium carbonate saturation (important in estuaries and nearshore). 

 Seminal papers on ocean acidification – Caldeira & Wicket, 2003; Royal Society 2005 – have been followed by a decade of expanding research.  On the west coast of North America, oyster aquaculture was challenged with major crashes in larval oyster production, mortality events at d-hinge stage (<4 days old), and near total failure of wild oyster recruitment in Washington State.

 A university researcher, Alan Barton, who worked closely with Whiskey Creek hatchery, a major oyster production facility at Netarts OR,  made the connection between upwelling events (strong offshore winds) and larval oyster recruitment failure.  (See Barton et al 2012).  With the addition of autonomous sensors to monitor pH and pCO2 at their ocean intake pipes, they have avoided most massive die-offs by not pumping during low pH conditions, thus avoiding introducing acidified, corrosive water into the hatchery.

 Fishermen, aquaculturists and researchers have joined forces to monitor these changes.  Buoys with autonomous pCO2 monitors at HOTS and BATS have documented the open-ocean decline of pH.  Nearshore and estuarine systems are subject to upwelling, fresh water inputs and high biological productivity.  This makes nearshore changes in carbonate chemistry more dynamic.

 We have formed a research and monitoring collaboration called C-CAN  (California Current Acidification Network).  We have a website – http://c-can.msi.ucsb.edu – which, along with archiving current news, research papers and communications efforts, maintains a list of active autonomous pH sensors (buoy data) on the west coast.

 Buoys sometimes fail, and biofouling interferes with the sensor probes, but patterns appear over time nonetheless.  We would like to develop a network of autonomous sensors to measure pH, pCO2, tCO2, salinity and temperature accurate enough to describe the aragonite saturation state of seawater at locations in the California Current, particularly near shore.   Five years ago no such instrumentation was available, but in major oyster production facilities, we now have three systems in place  (and a fourth one operational soon), which can in real time describe aragonite saturation.  This is adaptation on the hot-seat of climate change.  A quote from Alan Barton:  “I feel like I’m living in the future.”  We all are!

[Bruce Steele]

http://www.whoi.edu/fileserver.do?id=66246&pt=2&p=59368.                      Here are some very nice graphics relating to acidification of the Arctic Ocean.   Fresh water from melting sea ice and large riverine sources reduces seawater alkalinity and contributes to current and future undersaturated conditions. As the permafrost melts frozen organic matter can add to contributions of Co2 released by bacterial remineralization. Projections for 2016 are 10% of the Arctic Ocean will be undersaturated but by 2050 the entire Arctic Ocean will be undersaturated part of the year.  There is undersaturation documented off the mouth of the Kuskokwim River in the Bering Sea. Along the edge of the shelf where the river freshened sea water meets the basin water which seasonal shoals ,areas of undersaturation occur. For some reason Tanner Crab aggregate in these areas. High productivity at the shelf break also increase coccolithophore blooms which naturally suppress carbonate mineral saturation. It is the addition of anthropogenic Co2 that will enlarge these current conditions until large areas of the Arctic and Bering Sea shelf waters are corrosive. I will follow up with a source for the Bering Sea research done by Jessica Cross and Jeremy Mathis at The University of Alaska Fairbanks.

[Bruce Steele]

http://www.whoi.edu/fileserver.do?id=66246&pt=2&p=59368

[Bruce Steele]

Here is a talk that predicts the current acidification and hypoxia along the coasts of Washington ,Oregon and California will proceed to anoxia and hydrogen sulfide production. We had a  large die-off of Dungeness crabs and invertebrates in Oregon during hypoxic ,low pH conditions in 2006. Although hypoxia has reoccured annually since the fish-kills haven't. Hydrogen Sulfide is nasty stuff and should it occur coastal residents will realize the problems we have bestowed upon our oceans will not be strictly a problem for fish and fishermen.   
The College of the Environment and the School of Oceanography invite you a lecture featuring renowned ocean chemist and Walker-Ames Scholar, Peter Brewer. Hear him discuss the implications a changing climates has on the oceans in his talk titled: Common sense chemistry and a true tipping point for climate right off our shores.

About the Lecture:
Warming of the oceans is reducing oxygen content with important consequences for the survival of marine life. The implications of this can be far-reaching, but the basic problem can be described and understood quite simply: oxygen is less soluble in warm water,
and microbes decompose organic matter faster at higher temperatures. While the basic facts are clear, it is only recently that scientists have begun to understand the scale of this problem. In some areas, such as off the West Coast of the U.S., the effects can be so dramatic that toxic hydrogen sulfide gas is likely to appear there for the first time in tens of millions of years.

Brewer will describe and quantify the problem, discuss the fragile chemical buffer that now exists, and show video footage illustrating the cascade of processes unleashed by decreased oxygen levels, transforming viable fisheries into bacterial ghost towns.

When:    Tuesday, April 30, 2013 at 6:30 p.m.

Where:   School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences Auditorium, Seattle Campus

[Bruce Steele]

It takes time to test( stress test) various species to the effects of increased Co2  and reduced pH . Here is an important paper on how two very important  crab species respond to a near future pH of 7.5.  Juvenile Red King Crab suffer 100% mortality after 90 days exposure.  These are multimillion dollar industries for Alaska .    http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0060959
As an indication of how soon we can expect 7.5pH there aren't autonomous pH sensors deployed at depth in Alaska. Grab samples show undersaturation <7.8 pH in the Bering Sea but here in Southern Calif. at 87 meters we have 7.66 pH for weeks on end at a buoy near SanDiego. For Alaska and the Russian far east surface undersaturation < 7.8 pH is expected within 20-30 years, and at depth we can expect the area in the Bering Sea to expand rapidly. There are also areas near the mouth of the McKenzie River with documented undersaturation.

[Bruce Steele]

Major reductions in the fatty acid ( FA ) content of diatoms in response to climate change may seriously impact food webs. " Algae inhibiting brine channels of the ice ,in particular diatoms, contribute significantly to primary production in ice covered polar areas, providing a substantial carbon source to higher levels."           Discussion paper at link below.                                                             http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/10/6637/2013/bgd-10-6637-2013.html       

[ggelsrinc]

Major reductions in the fatty acid ( FA ) content of diatoms in response to climate change may seriously impact food webs. " Algae inhibiting brine channels of the ice ,in particular diatoms, contribute significantly to primary production in ice covered polar areas, providing a substantial carbon source to higher levels."           Discussion paper at link below.                                                             http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/10/6637/2013/bgd-10-6637-2013.html     

Speaking of ocean acidification, have you came across any studies that looked at CO2 emissions on top of all the other acid rain we've spread around the world since the industrial revolution? I recall a time as a child when the rain didn't sting your eyes and when the Milky Way was easily visible within the city limits. There is definitely more to the change in clear skies than light pollution, because I've been going to the same mountain areas since I was a young child and had a good telescope since my early teens. On the east coast of the US, I've had some experiences with rain so acid you just couldn't see with stinging eyes and had to get away from it. I would think production records could be used for accurate calculations.

[Bruce Steele]

ggelsrinc,  I thought you said you were a chemist by training so maybe you can answer this better than I can. Here is emissions of chemicals that cause acid rain.  When coal is burned, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and mercury compounds are released. For that reason, coal-fired boilers are required to have control devices to reduce the amount of emissions that are released.

The average emission rates in the United States from coal-fired generation are: 2,249 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 13 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 6 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.3

Mining, cleaning, and transporting coal to the power plant generate additional emissions. For example, methane, a potent greenhouse gas that is trapped in the coal, is often vented during these processes to increase safety.

Oil
Burning oil at power plants produces nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide, methane, and mercury compounds. The amount of sulfur dioxide and mercury compounds can vary greatly depending on the sulfur and mercury content of the oil that is burned.

The average emissions rates in the United States from oil-fired generation are: 1672 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 12 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 4 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.4

In addition, oil wells and oil collection equipment are a source of emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. The large engines that are used in the oil drilling, production, and transportation processes burn natural gas or diesel that also produce emissions.
Add up sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides produced and compare them to the 30+ giggatonnes of Co2 emitted annually.  The oceans are absorbing 10+ giggatonnes of Co2 emissions annually so my question to you is how many tons of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides are the oceans absorbing?

[Jim Williams]

When I moved from Washington State to Massachusetts in 1970 one of the first things I noticed was how the rain stung.  I also had to learn that the direction to the ocean was called East.

[ggelsrinc]

ggelsrinc,  I thought you said you were a chemist by training so maybe you can answer this better than I can. Here is emissions of chemicals that cause acid rain.  When coal is burned, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and mercury compounds are released. For that reason, coal-fired boilers are required to have control devices to reduce the amount of emissions that are released.

The average emission rates in the United States from coal-fired generation are: 2,249 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 13 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 6 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.3

Mining, cleaning, and transporting coal to the power plant generate additional emissions. For example, methane, a potent greenhouse gas that is trapped in the coal, is often vented during these processes to increase safety.

Oil
Burning oil at power plants produces nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide, methane, and mercury compounds. The amount of sulfur dioxide and mercury compounds can vary greatly depending on the sulfur and mercury content of the oil that is burned.

The average emissions rates in the United States from oil-fired generation are: 1672 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 12 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 4 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.4

In addition, oil wells and oil collection equipment are a source of emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. The large engines that are used in the oil drilling, production, and transportation processes burn natural gas or diesel that also produce emissions.
Add up sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides produced and compare them to the 30+ giggatonnes of Co2 emitted annually.  The oceans are absorbing 10+ giggatonnes of Co2 emissions annually so my question to you is how many tons of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides are the oceans absorbing?

There is a little more to it than that to calculate all those emissions from the industrial age that would acidify an ocean. We get a lot of CO2 from making cement and many ores are sulfides, like nickel, zinc, lead, mercury, silver and copper. We also have the sulfur emissions to make coke for the steel industry. We make a lot of hydrogen sulfide making paper. There's a lot of hydrogen sulfide in natural gas, sometimes 90%. If it's taken out of the ground, it has to be somewhere and the Earth has plenty of sulfur, it's a cheap nasty fuel. Sewage is another source for H2S and rice production for methane and it's all going to acidify.

We can remove some of the metal pollutants and mercury tends to get the most press, but those scrubbers aren't very efficient. If there are other metals around, like cadmium, vanadium and arsenic, it will find it's way into that coal and other fuels. Sometimes coal deposits have a sulfur layer that will spontaneously ignite in areas where it's been piled up from a coal mine.

[Jim Williams]

There is a little more to it than that to calculate all those emissions from the industrial age that would acidify an ocean. We get a lot of CO2 from making cement and many ores are sulfides, like nickel, zinc, lead, mercury, silver and copper. We also have the sulfur emissions to make coke for the steel industry. We make a lot of hydrogen sulfide making paper. There's a lot of hydrogen sulfide in natural gas, sometimes 90%. If it's taken out of the ground, it has to be somewhere and the Earth has plenty of sulfur, it's a cheap nasty fuel. Sewage is another source for H2S and rice production for methane and it's all going to acidify.

We can remove some of the metal pollutants and mercury tends to get the most press, but those scrubbers aren't very efficient. If there are other metals around, like cadmium, vanadium and arsenic, it will find it's way into that coal and other fuels. Sometimes coal deposits have a sulfur layer that will spontaneously ignite in areas where it's been piled up from a coal mine.

Yummy stuff for a silicon based being.

[Bruce Steele]

ggelsrinc,  Of course there are natural cycles for nitrogen, sulfur, and Co2. You were talking about acid rain. So2 and nitrogen oxides are the primary cause. U.S. Emissions of So2 reduced 83% in last few
decades.
 NOx emission by U.S. not increasing. Acid rain on the U.S. East coast reduced as a result.  73% of So2 emissions are from power plants , 20% for other industries.  If you compare the ~ 19 pounds of So2+ NOx to the 2,249 lbs. of Co2 emitted per MWh of energy produced in power plants you can get a rough approximation of So2+NOx to Co2 at 1%.   Not counting lesser sources.  So just ballpark says 99% of ocean acidification is from Co2 emissions. You are a chemist so you can figure this out yourself.  Co2 emissions have gone up from~ 22.5 billion tons( gt ) to ~ 32 gt  1990-2012. That is what is causing ocean acidification. 

[ggelsrinc]

ggelsrinc,  Of course there are natural cycles for nitrogen, sulfur, and Co2. You were talking about acid rain. So2 and nitrogen oxides are the primary cause. U.S. Emissions of So2 reduced 83% in last few
decades.
 NOx emission by U.S. not increasing. Acid rain on the U.S. East coast reduced as a result.  73% of So2 emissions are from power plants , 20% for other industries.  If you compare the ~ 19 pounds of So2+ NOx to the 2,249 lbs. of Co2 emitted per MWh of energy produced in power plants you can get a rough approximation of So2+NOx to Co2 at 1%.   Not counting lesser sources.  So just ballpark says 99% of ocean acidification is from Co2 emissions. You are a chemist so you can figure this out yourself.  Co2 emissions have gone up from~ 22.5 billion tons( gt ) to ~ 32 gt  1990-2012. That is what is causing ocean acidification.

You're a fisherman and you can't see that I mentioned years of acid rain emissions on top of CO2 emissions. I live between two estuaries and what do you think happens when it rains and the pH is 2.4? It's a big ocean experiencing the "Revelle Factor" with CO2 and that isn't the case with acid rain, which can concentrate in a local area with runoff. It doesn't surprise me these areas are considered the most vulnerable. This diagram puts 22% of CO2 emissions going into the oceans, so the contributions of other things besides CO2 to ocean acidification get changed by multiples and the world involves more than just a power plant. To come up with an honest assessment of things contributing to ocean acidification involves a lot more than just looking at power plant emissions.





I'd say most the carbon from that forest that was destroyed will get converted back to CO2 shortly.

Yes, we have cut back some on SO2 emissions to the air by using flue-gas desulfurization, which uses lime and lime is made from heating limestone above 825 C which gives off CO2. That's why manufacturing cement causes so much CO2 emissions and obviously fuel is needed to heat it. In the process, the ways the Earth has sequestered CO2 gets involved and has to do it all over again.

Much of that exported US coal is refined coal, so if you ever run across someone complaining about government subsidies for alternative energy, use it to compare. It's subsidized more for the electricity generated than solar and wind. Coal does a great job just laying in the ground and gases like natural gas are much easier to clean and transport. Alaska would be our number #1 producer of natural gas, but the oil companies didn't build a pipeline for it, because they viewed natural gas as competition to crude oil. The natural gas is used to the warm crude oil for transport and the rest is pumped back into the ground. When you're in a lab and want to collect nasty things, carbon is the first thing that enters your mind. If there is uranium around or other nasty metals, it will collect it. The potential pollutants depend on where coal is mined. It's common to have electrostatic precipitators gather some of the metals on top of scrubbers in power plants and oil refineries, because crude oil also has metals.

[Bruce Steele]

ggelsrinc,  I am a fisherman and I have been at it  for 40 years, since I was 20. You are correct in pointing out terrestrially supplied runoff can exacerbate local pH conditions in estuaries. Fresh water even without acid rain is more acidic than the open ocean. Increased Co2 and phytoplankton blooms( that concentrate Co2 at the surface and release it at depth) together with increased nutrients from wastewater effluents and reduced O2 due to heating of the oceans all add up trouble for marine life. I post here on the carbon cycle because the interactions of biogeochemistry fascinate me but when I know someone has a strong chemistry background I get nervous. I could no more debate a chemistry major/ Phd than I could a geneticist . I try to link peer reviewed science when I post to provide a little cover.      The carbon cycle graphic you linked shows a 2 gt  carbon sink which gets deposited into the reactive sediments in waters above the saturation horizon. In the deep oceans ( below the saturation horizon )the carbonates dissolve and become part of the 37,000 gt  carbon pool in the deep oceans. The saturation horizon is shoaling( getting closer to the surface ) 1-2 meters per year in the Pacific and 4 meters per year in the Atlantic. As it shoals it dissolves some of the reactive sediments and a portion of the long term carbon sink disappears. The dissolved Co2 can go back into the atmosphere when those deep waters upwell  back to the surface in the eastern equatorial pacific . So we humans are dumping 10 gt carbon annually while the ocean can only store 2 gt of that carbon long term(hundreds of thousands of years). The rate this is occurring is many times greater than anything we can find in the fossil record. Here on the west coast of North America the aragonite saturation horizon will shoal to the surface in less than 50 years. Calcite( another form of calcium carbonate) will take longer but once shoaled to the surface it will take tens of thousands of years for enough terrestrially supplied alkalinity to rebalance the surface waters to 8.2 pH. Scares the hell out of an old salty dog. Very few people understand carbonate chemistry, I am an amateur. Life on this planet is dependent on the outcome of our little experiment...my opinion ,with the disclaimer, I am an amateur.

[ggelsrinc]

Bruce Steele-

I was looking for studies involving sources of acidification other than CO2. I did find something related to my thinking under Chesapeake Bay, but couldn't find anything but a ton of studies talking about CO2 in Google Scholar, so it is being studied for that particular area. 

Yet while acidity is increasing in the more saline regions of the bay, the opposite is happening in the less saline waters, according to the study.  Lead author of the study, Dr. George Waldbusser   of Oregon State University, said “The regional changes in acidity revealed in our analysis are greater than what could be caused by increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide alone.”

Source: http://www.celsias.com/article/chesapeake-bay-acidity-affects-sea-life/

Here is the watershed:



The reason I brought it up is I've heard about the acidification along the east coast of the US is projected to being higher earlier. I do recall times where acid rain was so bad it forced you to get away from it. 2.4 is the pH of distilled vinegar and it's a strange feeling to have rain force you away, when it isn't even raining that hard.

That article says the Chesapeake Bay annually produces more fish and shellfish than any estruary in the country.

[Bruce Steele]

ggelsrinc,  If the acidity was being modified by terrestrial sources one would expect the changes to be greater in the fresh water component rather than the saline waters. When I see George I will ask him but it might be a couple months. The pH is only one part of what is required to determine the saturation state of any particular water sample. TA ( total alkalinity ) is supplied by riverine inputs from bicarbonate . Bicarbonates are supplied by siliceous rock(olivine and serpentine ) which contain magnesium carbonate or karst landscapes which supply bicarbonate from calcium carbonate.  The buffering  of bicarbonate changes the saturation state ( the solubility of calcium carbonate). For the purpose of determining biological impacts on marine life we use aragonite saturation and for quality we need to know aragonite saturation within .2 degrees of accuracy. Aragonite saturation>1 is saturated and values <1 are undersaturated. Pacific Oysters suffer mortality at 1.5 but at 1.7 they are just a little drunk.  To monitor the pH and dissolved Co2 in seawater we have buoys. There is one at Grey's Reef Georgia . For buoy data see my C-CAN link on former post Mar. 9 , click buoy data. Pacific Marine Environmental Labs ( PMEL ) maintains dozens of buoys in the pacific and some in the Atlantic.             

 

[ggelsrinc]

Bruce Steele-

It is counter-intuitive to find more acidity in the more saline area, particularly in that place. The scientist say this:

The scientists believe that the diversity in acidity levels within the bay waters causes significant changes in the estuary's ecosystem.  Nutrients from sewage systems and agricultural runoff promote an increase in phytoplankton in the upper bay. As these plants grow they absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide, resulting in less acidic waters in those regions.  At the same time, when the phytoplankton are carried toward the ocean by the bay's currents, they are consumed by bacteria and animals that then release the carbon dioxide taken up the by phytoplankton.  This stays in the water making it more acidic.

Source: http://www.celsias.com/article/chesapeake-bay-acidity-affects-sea-life/

...and that's hard to swallow since phytoplankton don't live that long. It sounds like the phytoplankton graveyard hypothesis. What's more amazing is that more acidic higher saline area is the site of the largest known bolide impact in the country (Chesapeake Bay impact crater) and the marine impact area was rich in lime. There is also the Toms Canyon impact crater off Atlantic City which they think may have been the same event around 35 million years ago. At the time of impact, the shoreline was further west near Richmond.





The impact explains why that whole area is rich in bivalves. The Chesapeake Bay once supplied over half the oysters consumed in the world and the Delaware Bay is also a rich estruary. I've been to beaches where the beach sand was mostly carbonates, like broken up shells.

There has been some marsh destruction down in the lower Chesapeake Bay by the nutria (coypu, river rat). I think they've been eradicated on the Delmarva Peninsula, but they are still in marshes on the west side of Chesapeake Bay. Since these marshes are nitrogen limited and span areas of natural drain, they are also having problems with agricultural runoff and poultry is a common business. I've seen large piles of waste without even a tarp to limit runoff.



Hypertrophication is Dr. George Waldbusser's explanation for the additional acidity and it was the desire to combat algae blooms that motivated the study. Oysters are only around 1% of their historic population in the Chesapeake Bay and they are trying to restore this keystone species to improve water quality. The catch-22 is in some places they want to use oysters to improve water quality, but they don't do it because of concerns that people will get hold of oysters unfit for consumption. They claim you could once see down 20 feet in the Chesapeake when the Europeans arrived, because there were so many oysters filtering the water. This unfortunately isn't a picture of celebrating Saint Patricks's Day on the Potomac:



http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/oyster-restoration-study-kroeger.pdf

[JackTaylor]

Massive amounts of charcoal enter the worlds' oceans

The researchers analyzed water samples from all over the world. They demonstrated that soluble charcoal accounts for ten percent of the total amount of dissolved organic carbon.
Read more at http://www.sciencecodex.com/massive_amounts_of_charcoal_enter_the_worlds_oceans-110754#xsTMYvCsa2vLZbCI.99

[Bruce Steele]

Jack, From the article. " Surprisingly,in any river across the world about ten percent of organic carbon that is dissolved in the water came from charcoal." " According to these estimates, about 25 million tons of dissolved charcoal is transported from land to the sea each year." So the total dissolved organic carbon(DOC) transport from this study is ~ 250 million tons per annum delivered from riverine sources to the oceans. There are also large amounts of particulate organic carbon(POC) delivered from riverine sources which through organic processes are converted into (DOC) dissolved organic carbon and dissolved inorganic carbon(DIC) once they flow into the oceans.   What would be helpful would be some calculations on the labile and semi-labile fractions of the (DOC) delivered from land to the sea. That is does the carbon delivered to the ocean get quickly converted into (DIC) or is there a fraction that enters a longer term carbon sink?       

[JackTaylor]

"does the carbon delivered to the ocean get quickly converted --- or is there a fraction that enters a longer term carbon sink?"     

Good Question(s). Hopefully they'll follow-up in future research.

[frankendoodle]

http://news.yahoo.com/ancient-snail-shells-hint-future-global-warming-191044808.html

[Bruce Steele]

frankendoodle,  Here's the abstract. The writer of your post was deep time challenged.                       http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/04/19/1210930110.abstract

                           

[Bruce Steele]

There are a few places around the world where Co2 vents into the oceans from volcanic activity. These sites offer the opportunity for researchers to study what projected Co2 increases will do to various taxa in real world conditions. There were only a few foraminifera that went extinct during the acidification event during the PETM. Larger ,longer acidification events during the end Permian caused the extinction of many more lifeforms. This new paper projects foraminifera extinctions to begin within the next 80 years based on how they respond to current conditions near Co2 vents in New Guinea. The shallow water tropical foraminifera can't handle 7.9 pH.  The fossil record is clear because calcium carbonate shells build up in shallow seas and drilled core samples can document past changes and extinctions. Because world average ocean pH will drop to ~ 7.8 by 2100 with BAU we can expect foraminifera to begin to go extinct by then but if we push projections another 100 years to 2200  surface ocean pH will drop to ~ 7.6 even if we curtail our Co2 inputs when we hit 1000ppm in the atmosphere . The atmosphere and the surface oceans will equalize partial pressures of Co2 long after we quit burning fossil fuels. (We are retracing the end Permian, terrestrial extinctions will follow. My opinion)        http://www.nature.com/srep/2013/130503/srep01769/full/srep01769.html

[Bruce Steele]

 The above link is having server problems but it worked earlier.   EPOCA blog has this article today.   Type foraminifera into the search box 
http://oceanacidification.wordpress.com/                   

[Bruce Steele]

This is a paragraph from the foraminifera paper. I would think this would garner more attention than it has so far. Extinction and lack of adaptability should ring bells .                                                        "Several mass extinctions of deep sea benthic foraminifera occurred in the geological past, most of which were linked to increased pCO2 and/or temperature, but some geological studies from shallow reef environments also observed increased foraminiferal dominance when corals became rare. None of these previous extinctions were as severe as the ecological or even taxonomic extinction in shallow carbonate areas we predict. Previous natural pCO2 increases occurred one to two orders of magnitude slower and were associated with less reduced calcite or aragonite saturation states than the anthropogenic increases presently observed."

[wili]

This from Boa05att at the blog:

http://neven1.typepad.com/blog/2013/05/greenland-snow-drought-spells-trouble.html#comments

A new paleoclimate study in Science suggests that climate sensitivity in the arctic is even higher than previously thought, and that the GIS was likely to have frequently been in an almost ice free state.

' “One of our major findings is that the Arctic was very warm in the Pliocene [~ 5.3 to 2.6 million years ago] when others have suggestedatmospheric CO2 was very much like levels we see today. This could tell us where we are going in the near future. In other words, the Earth system response to small changes in carbon dioxide is bigger than suggested by earlier models,” the authors state. '

Press release:
http://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/ice-free-arctic-may-be-our-future-say-umass-amherst-international-researchers

See this excellent talk for a presentation of the results:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxbOSB7zDgY&feature=player_embedded

This is also being vigorously discussed over at CP:

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/05/12/1993531/climate-sensitivity-stunner-last-time-co2-levels-hit-400-parts-per-million-the-arctic-was-14f-warmer/

[Lewis C]

Can anyone give a clear outline - and or links to succinct papers - on the propensity for oceanic carbon dioxide outgassing in the event of airborne CO2 being peaked and then reduced by human agency ?

My interest in this stems from concern over just how long ocean acidification will be maintained even under our best efforts at a global program of carbon recovery.

Regards,

Lewis

[Bruce Steele]

Lewis, The eastern tropical pacific has upwelling that year round delivers Co2 enriched waters to the surface . Co2 is ventilated into the atmosphere as a natural process when partial pressures of dissolved Co2 exceed the partial pressure of the atmospheric Co2 concentrations. It's more complicated than that including temperature and salinity but here is a paper that describes and quantifies current fluxes.                                                                                                          http://www.biogeosciences.net/6/149/2009/bg-6-149-2009.pdf

[Bruce Steele]

Lewis,  the oceans will uptake ~ 80 % of anthropogenic Co2 in the hundreds of years timescale(Archer1997) see link. The time it takes the ocean to drop back to current dissolved Co2 levels or pH levels is dependent on total Co2 emissions. Caldiera and Wicket ran models that show where BAU takes ocean pH and how long it stays acidified under various emission pathways. The question of what is the future of ocean currents and the MOC ?and how will ocean heating and the slowdown of Antarctic Bottom Water formation ultimately change equatorial upwelling is still open.                http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab/Caldeira_research/pdf/Caldeira_Wickett_JGR2005.pdf          http://earthref.org/ERR/16966/

[Bruce Steele]

It is melt season and focus is watching ice right now. Acidification is continueing apace but there aren't satellite pictures or weather models to watch on a daily basis. Just models and numbers from the few buoy's. We can look back at buoy archives from the last decade and see the drop in ocean pH and with a good degree of confidence predict how pH will change as we move into the future.  This latest paper by Hauri et al describes how conditions will change here along the coast of California over the next 30-40 years. " Undersaturation will become very likely the norm near the seafloor by 2030 and if atmospheric Co2 increases beyond~500ppm, this layer will become permanently undersaturated. Combined with a fourfold increase in intensity , the resulting increase in severity of low aragonite saturation state events will substantially affect the viability of calcifying organisms and will alter ecosystem structure.".    A full version of the paper is linked in the PDF ( open source ).                       http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/grl.50618/abstract;jsessionid=CA9DE3A01F49B3F2954F3CD8BEDCE858.d02t01

[ritter]

This latest paper by Hauri et al describes how conditions will change here along the coast of California over the next 30-40 years.

Thanks (?) for this. As a fellow Californian, I'm horrified at the thought of such radical changes to our coast. It has always represented for me that "bigness" that would be forever constant and has provided wonder, inspiration and comfort--perhaps much like others get from faith. We have left no stone unturned in our even handed destruction of our home.

[LurkyMcLurkerson]

Part of the issue that will come up for many of the questions people ask in this thread is that the ocean chemistry of CO2 is actually pretty complicated -- it has been a long time since my quantitative analysis coursework, but we did focus on the chemistry quite a fair amount, and as I recall, there is a _very_ complex set of equilibria -- carbon dioxide to carbonic acid to bicarbonate to carbonate, the bicarbonate acting as a buffer, all of the concentrations on each other, and depending also on temperature.

I'm sure you're broadly aware of this already, looking at some of the things you've linked above, but my point is that underneath things like Bjerrum plots, oceanic pH and concentrations/solubilities of carbonate compounds are extremely complex. In ways I find incredibly disquieting, to be clear. With little idea how much heat is pumping into the deep oceans alongside the increasing [CO2 etc], I am extremely worried for the health of the deeper waters and for more benthic species as the hotter-than, low aragonite waters upwell and mix. Those upwelling areas will also create areas of altered CO2 dissolution, much more quickly than I think anybody has anticipated.

But I am no expert in this stuff, and my chemistry knowledge here is... we'll just say it's been a while. It is, though, one of the things I've found really deeply concerning as I've started to see evidence of greater heat than anticipated feeding into ocean systems, though. I don't believe that most modeling has accounted sufficiently for the effect that will have on the equilibrium concentrations of the various reactants and products in the pathway; I think that the ocean is taking in far more heat than we anticipated, deeper than we thought, and that will have profound effects on the pH we're talking about, too.   

[Bruce Steele]

  Lurky,  The chemistry is a challenge for most people ,myself included. The biological responses are equally difficult to research and understand and the monitoring instruments necessary for pH, total alkalinity, or pCo2 all require good calibration and maintenance.  How the ocean moves Co2 from surface waters into intermediate or deep waters , where those sources are and the time and processes that ultimately are responsible for their transport back to the surface I find fascinating. Antarctica and the southern oceans play a very large part.  The contribution of particulate organic carbon and dissolved organic from terrestrial sources and the parts that DOC and POC play in the carbon cycle all make the subject difficult.  These processes are ultimately responsible for maintaining ocean health and productivity. They provide a sink for carbon produced by living organisms both aquatic and terrestrial. Aragonite and calcite saturation state is recorded in the deep ocean strata so we have a record of how the ocean responded to Co2 perturbations in the past.  We have good evidence that acidification has been a part of some of the large extinction events over the last 250 million years. We also are quickly ( thirty years ) approaching  a state of ocean chemistry that hasn't happened since the PETM(56 million years)  for large parts of nearshore shelf waters and polar waters worldwide.  The PETM does not qualify as a large extinction event but there were extinctions of foraminifira.  The processes that balance ocean pH are dependent on rain carrying alkalinity from silica minerals or terrestrial carbonates back into the oceans and it takes tens of thousands of years to rebalance ocean pH after an acidification event. Because the processes of rebalancing pH are slow the rate of atmospheric Co2 increase determines the severity of acidification events. A large Co2 increase over a 100,000 thousand year time period doesn't result in acidification. A large increase over 200 years is unpresidented and the acidification event we are going to get may well be larger than the PETM event.  So for me understanding the exact mechanisms of carbon chemistry aren't as important as understanding what the fossil record has to say. Even if we slow down our emissions trajectory it will have zero ( 200 years to burn 5000 gt carbon or 500 years to burn it ) impact on the ultimate ocean pH. We have to leave a substantial part of the proven fossil fuel reserve buried. Waiting 40 more years with BAU is a road to the sixth extinction .   

[Laurent]

http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1832.html
There is a study that may connect the carbon cycle and the nitrogen cycle !?

[wili]

Carbon Dioxide Is ‘Driving Fish Crazy’

http://climatestate.com/magazine/2013/06/carbon-dioxide-is-driving-fish-crazy/

Another highlight from last year's finding on how much CO2 uptake interferes with our crucial environment.