That Oceanic Feeling

 

Jeffrey St. Clair

A report by the British Antarctic Survey concludes that the melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet is now inevitable. Even under the best possible scenario of reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, the ice sheet will continue to melt, at a speed three times faster than during the 20th century, causing global sea levels to rise by 3.9 feet by 2100. The melting of the entire ice sheet would raise sea levels worldwide by 17 feet.

+ For 223 straight days, Earth’s sea surface temperatures have been at record warm levels.

+ As of mid-October, 78% of the global oceans were experiencing a marine heatwave.

+ A new study in Nature asserts that these changes in ocean temperature and the associated loss of oxygen are causing a centuries-long irreversible loss in the habitable zone of the upper 1000 meters of the world’s oceans: “These results suggest that the combined effect of warming and deoxygenation will have profound and long-lasting impacts on the viability of marine ecosystems, well after global temperatures have peaked.”

+ North Pacific marine heatwaves – super-charged by climate change – killed 10 billion snow crabs, largely through starvation.

+ We have the clearest evidence to date that the Gulf Stream is weakening and may ultimately collapse, with catastrophic implications for the marine life of the Atlantic and the global climate. According to research conducted by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, over the past four decades, the flow of warm ocean water through the straits of Florida has slowed by four percent. Not only does the Gulf Stream distribute oxygen, nutrients, carbon, and heat around the Atlantic, but its sweeping currents also regulate sea levels, keeping near-shore water levels as much as up to 5 feet lower than the ocean farther off-shore.