Calm Down, Hippies
7th January 2012
Concern that the Arctic Ocean is becoming massively less salty due to its ice cap melting – which could have knock-on consequences for the planet’s climate – is unfounded, NASA scientists have said.
For years, researchers have seen falling salinity readings in the Canadian half of the Arctic Ocean. This has led them to theorise that large amounts of fresh water were being added due to permanent disappearance of ice. In itself this might not mean a lot – sea levels would be unaffected, as the Arctic ice floats atop the sea – but it had been feared that addition of so much fresh water could impact the oceanic “conveyor belt” which moves heat around the planet, with major consequences for the climate.
The enviro-nazis, of course, went ballistic. But it was another case of ‘sky-is-falling’ premature ejaculation.
According to Kwok and his colleagues, analysing readings from the satellites overhead, new freshwater in the Beaufort Sea comes not from melted ice but from rivers in Russia. Formerly this freshwater would have stayed largely in the Russian side of the Arctic, but a shift in circulation has occurred.