Over the past century, increased greenhouse gas emissions have given rise to an excess of energy in the Earth system.
Over the past century, increased greenhouse gas emissions have given rise to an excess of energy in the Earth system. More than 90% of this excess energy has been absorbed by the ocean, leading to increased ocean temperatures and associated sea level rise, while moderating surface warming.
The multi-disciplinary team of scientists have published estimates in PNAS, that global warming of the oceans of 436 x 1021 Joules has occurred from 1871 to present (roughly 1000 times annual worldwide human primary energy consumption) and that comparable warming happened over the periods 1920-1945 and 1990-2015.
The estimates support evidence that the oceans are absorbing most of the excess energy in the climate system arising from greenhouse gases emitted by human activities.
Prof Laure Zanna (Physics), who led the international team of researchers said: 'Our reconstruction is in line with other direct estimates and provides evidence for ocean warming before the 1950s.'
The researchers' technique to reconstruct ocean warming is based on a mathematical approach originally developed by Prof Samar Khatiwala (Earth Sciences) to reconstruct human made CO2 uptake by the ocean.
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