New Scientist: 30% reduction in Gulf Stream

New Scientist
Failing ocean current raises fears of mini ice age
18:00 30 November 2005
NewScientist.com news service
Fred Pearce
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8398


The ocean current that gives western Europe its relatively balmy climate is stuttering, raising fears that it might fail entirely and plunge the continent into a mini ice age.

The dramatic finding comes from a study of ocean circulation in the North Atlantic, which found a 30% reduction in the warm currents that carry water north from the Gulf Stream.

The slow-down, which has long been predicted as a possible consequence of global warming, will give renewed urgency to intergovernmental talks in Montreal, Canada, this week on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.

Harry Bryden at the Southampton Oceanography Centre in the UK, whose group carried out the analysis, says he is not yet sure if the change is temporary or signals a long-term trend. "We don’t want to say the circulation will shut down," he told New Scientist. "But we are nervous about our findings. They have come as quite a surprise."

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From that dkos entry:

Update <2005-12-1 17:38:43 by Drezden>:

Since several people have asked about what is going on in the Pacific I looked around to find some more recent information. The big thing that is currently affecting areas of the Pacific up and down the west coast is repeated events of deadly algae blooms, hypoxia (ultra low oxygen levels), and upwelling loss.

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It's explained in the next paragraph,
here's the rest of the text (3 paragraphs+link):


Normally at regular points throughout the year the winds shift on the west coast and this results it currents that pull nutrients from the colder depths of the Pacific. This upwelling brings plankton and minerals to the surface that not only ensure healthy numbers of Salmon and other important fish, but spread throughout the ecosystem to sea birds and other mammals.

Recently these wind patterns have started shifting resulting in no upwelling at all or upwelling that comes very late in the year. This shuts off nutrient flows and cuts right through marine populations. 2005 in fact saw many sea bird populations suffer, especially for cormorants and common murres. Because the water isn't moving, it is also growing much warmer at the surface than normal.

Added to the warm waters are increased flows of fertilizer runoff from farming operations into the river systems. This fertilizer eventually hits the warmer ocean water and helps to create giant algae blooms that drain what little nutrients are available and draw oxygen from the water. This the causes dead spots in the ocean or hypoxia. For several years now dead spots like this have also started to appear all along the coast from Mexico to Oregon. Researchers are still trying to figure out what forces are at work here since many different events are taking place.

Stanford Report
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/march16/gulf-030905.html

...why small changes in global mean temperature portend huge changes in ecosystem processes.

Much of the scientific community appears to be of the "we need more data" camp, noting that the samples taken to date are too few and the change between them too small to give a reliable assessment of a trend.

That's absolutely not to suggest that Global Warming isn't a real threat, but simply at present we are not justified in making sweeping predictions based on the info available.

As a scientist,I'm pathologically incapable of NOT saying that more data are needed :-), but IIRC SO FAR the events we're seeing are consistent with predictions that call for a decline in the influence of the northern Gulf Stream current.

then I don't want to wait till the numbers DO become significant!

Recommended, by the way

:)

Warning - Rant follows.

Nothing is more frustrating to me than being way ahead of the curve with no way to help people catch up. The MSM right-wing propaganda has had environmental sciences in its sights ever since the first Earth Day. It's extremely discouraging to be called a radical for citing facts.
I often pay little attention nowadays - environmental catastrophe has gone into my mental background, filling a similar space to the one that used to be taken up by nuclear holocaust.

Saving a thousand dollars a year at Wal-Mart will easily be overwhelmed by such "minor, fringe" eventualities as, say, widespread famine because a colder Europe can no longer produce its own food, or the flooding of most major coastline cities from ice melting off southern and northern lands, or the desertification of all of Africa concamitant with climate change, or ...

You get the idea. I could go on for a while. Encourage me to keep paying attention, somebody! Surely ignorance can't really be the most painless stance, but I find myself flirting with it.

I guess he does what he can, where ever he finds himself.

and enjoy 'Access Hollywood.' Sorry.....I think we're doomed to RANT!

having had the same nightmares you have had I can tell you what I've chosen. I understand that my actions won't save the world and that in fact, humans are most likely doomed. That said, when there is nothing left but the fall, it matters how one falls. I choose integrity as best I know how. I keep my house cool in the winter and warmer in the summer, I use flourescent bulbs, boycott Walmart, recycle and reuse to the best of my ability not because it will save us but because it is the right thing to do.

And if the time should come in my lifetime I will die for Gaia because it is the right thing to do.

new findings.

:dem: :dem: :dem:

If everything was blamed on God....then we wouldn't know who is really to blame.