Arctic ice melt

Discussion in 'Earth Science' started by timojin, Jul 2, 2015.

  1. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    As the golf current keeps pumping warm to the north, and the ice continue melting it would affect rain in Europe producing drought.
     
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  3. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    Why do you claim that?
     
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  5. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    Gulf current melt Ice let say from O Centigrade to some above O < x that will continue to cool surface water, and so there will be less evaporation to produce rain along east European coast.
    I know England had their share of rain because of the warm water from the Gulf . Those warm current will be culled with the molten ice.
    Folks this is my opinion
    Comment welcome.
     
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  7. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    No, the climate is heating rather than cooling. The melting ice will not cool the current. It's all about salinity.
     
  8. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    Let me ask you. If a current have a temperature X and as the solid ice melts it will have a temperature Y, at the melt there is an increase a volume of Y temperature of cold water , this molten ice water will have a flow into the warm current. The mixed temperature should be X-Y.
    The mixing will it not reduce the temperature of the water flow down the European coast ?
     
  9. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    No because a warmer current means less ice will form in the first place. And sea that isn't covered by ice warms faster from the sun. Otherwise you are talking about a phenomenon which cancels itself out. Or some paradox which means warming currents translate into cooling currents and that makes no sense. However, if melting glacial freshwater disrupts currents based on salinity, it could shut down the whole transfer of heat from the equator and result in colder weather in Europe, which would devastate crops as much as a drought would.
     
  10. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Right. But X is considerably higher than it used to be, so the overall temperature is higher.
     
  11. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    So what do you think will France , Spain and Portugal experience more wet or dry clima ?
     
  12. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Unknown. Depends on the effects on the Gulf Stream.
     
  13. timojin Valued Senior Member

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  14. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    If the flow of melted ice water is large, the mixing will be quite slow. The much lighter fresh water floats on top of the denser salt water.

    It is said that the surface water even 25 miles East of the Amazon's mouth can be drunk. - It is still fresh enough, but in summer at least part of this is also due to fact it is warmer as well as fresh.
     
  15. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    I like your example of 25 mile . At starting my post I had in mind western part of Norway, France , Spain and Portugal, So the distance from the polar caps will more then several thousand miles and therefore might have more time to mix
     
  16. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    The gulf stream is mainly driven by the cooling of higher salt concentration water (due to more evaporation when in the tropics) becoming denser than local water east of Greenland and sinking. As that mass goes deeper, it cools even more and the flows along the bottom, part all the way into the Indian Ocean, where finally it is less salty and warmer so rises to the surface to begin flow back into the Northern Hemisphere. - This is the so called "thermo-haline piston" driver of the gulf stream.

    This flow is a great heat transfer towards the Arctic but now some even flows into the Arctic Ocean, and goes along the bottom of the Siberian Shelf, releasing CH4 from the hydrates there. As the flow of the gulf stream weakens, the heat delivered to the air west of England will decline and less water will evaporate and fall as rain or keep foggy London town, "foggy." Worse, the harbors on the West coast of Norway, like Bergan's, will ice over with a weaker gulf stream. The areas of your concern will be colder and more dry, at least until global warming dominates.
     
  17. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    Thank you. It is interesting
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