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Quantifying the impact of ocean acidification on our future climate

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posted on 2023-05-19, 07:38 authored by Matear, RJ, Lenton, A
Ocean acidification (OA) is the consequence of rising atmospheric CO2 levels, and it is occurring in conjunction with global warming. Observational studies show that OA will impact ocean biogeochemical cycles. Here, we use an Earth system model under the RCP8.5 emission scenario to evaluate and quantify the first-order impacts of OA on marine biogeochemical cycles, and its potential feedback on our future climate. We find that OA impacts have only a small impact on the future atmospheric CO2 (less than 45 ppm) and global warming (less than a 0.25 K) by 2100. While the climate change feedbacks are small, OA impacts may significantly alter the distribution of biological production and remineralisation, which would alter the dissolved oxygen distribution in the ocean interior. Our results demonstrate that the consequences of OA will not be through its impact on climate change, but on how it impacts the flow of energy in marine ecosystems, which may significantly impact their productivity, composition and diversity.

History

Publication title

Biogeosciences

Volume

11

Issue

14

Pagination

3965-3983

ISSN

1726-4170

Department/School

Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies

Publisher

Copernicus GmbH

Place of publication

Bahnhofsallee 1e, Goettingen, 37081 Germany

Rights statement

Copyright 2014 Authors. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Repository Status

  • Open

Socio-economic Objectives

Global effects of climate change (excl. Australia, New Zealand, Antarctica and the South Pacific) (excl. social impacts)

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