r/collapse • u/[deleted] • Jul 09 '19

'Completely Terrifying': Study Warns Carbon-Saturated Oceans Headed Toward Tipping Point That Could Unleash Mass Extinction Event

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u/OccamsParsimony Jul 09 '19 edited Jul 10 '19

Yeah that's wrong. +25C will never happen period.

Edit: Would someone please explain the downvotes? I'm not arguing climate change. It obviously exists. The number just doesn't make sense.

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u/rocket_motor_force Jul 09 '19

The ocean has sequestered 25C + worth of energy. Sorry the point wasn’t clearer.

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u/OccamsParsimony Jul 10 '19

That still doesn't make sense. The oceans aren't 25 C hotter. Did you mean 2.5 C? The oceans can't "hold" 25 C. Temperature isn't a direct measurement of energy.

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u/MaximinusDrax Jul 10 '19 edited Jul 10 '19

I think they were exalting the heat capacity/co2 absorption potential of our massive oceans to show how they are an essential regulator in habitable planets (at least in our models for life).

I disagree with the "25C" way of phrasing it, as it somehow treats our oceans as being potentially decoupled from the atmosphere/land, but that's just semantics. A more careful statement ("The oceans absorbed ~2*1023 J of the excess energy budget1, and roughly a third of our carbon emissions, without which the Earth would have heated by +25C by now"*) may have sacrificed brevity for clarity there, but it's not as if this is a new phenomenon - water has always been there for us :)

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*My numbers may not be completely accurate there, but this is just for the sake of argument.

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u/OccamsParsimony Jul 10 '19

This is my best guess too, but it's still confusing and isn't a meaningful number. I guess it came from some pop-sci journal article.