• Question: what wil happen if the sea climate chances

    Asked by olly to Clare, Dave, Glo, Ozge, Sean on 17 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Clare Woulds

      Clare Woulds answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      The ocean will get warmer slightly, and the way the ocean currents flow might change. Also extra CO2 will dissolve in the ocean and make it more acid, which is a problem for algae and animals that build shells. Also there will be less oxygen dissolved in it, which is also a problem for some animals.

    • Photo: Ozge Ozkaya

      Ozge Ozkaya answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      I think Clare covered it all really nicely

    • Photo: Sean Clement

      Sean Clement answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      As well as what Clare mentioned, we’ll see more Bleaching of Coral reefs in tropical climates. Bleaching is where Corals stop being able to survive because of increased water temperatures reduces their ability to create food for themselves. They also completely lose their colour and trun from this:

      To this:

      If ‘bleached’ for long enough, entire coral reefs can die. This happened to lots of reefs in 1998 and we’re only starting to see recovery now. The world has gotten warmer since and we’re afraid that soon we’ll have another year as bad as 1998 and we’ll see a lot of reefs suffer as a result…

    • Photo: Dave Sproson

      Dave Sproson answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      On top of what the other guys have said – there’s a big problem with a warming ocean is sea-level rise. The level of the ocean can rise both from the melting of land-ice (http://ias.im/51.216) and because as when water warms up, it expands a little. A little expansion of water over the ~4 km depth of the ocean can cause quite a large increase in sea-level. This is a big problem for low-lying islands, or for towns and cities that are build at sea level near the ocean.

      Another worry is that changes in the temperature of the sea surface could lead to changes in weather patterns, and particularly in rainfall. This could mean that places that now only just about get enough rainfall may really struggle in the future.

    • Photo: Gloeta Massie

      Gloeta Massie answered on 17 Jun 2011:

      On a cheerful note, some things – like toxin producing dinoflagellates and super deadly jellyfish will probably be really happy in a warmer, more acidic ocean and grow and spread out into new places. Oh. Wait a second…

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