Thermocline

According to the new proposed model, in addition to the anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) due to land -use change and fossil fuel burning, significant emissions of CO2 are released from the ocean at sites of upwelling currents, which connect the global overturning circulation with the sea surface, as exemplified by the upwelling currents along the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC). Carbon dioxide was sequestered in deep oceanic layers which were disturbed through detonations of the nuclear bomb tests early in the1960s as confirmed by multiple time series of temperature and geochemical records. New features contributed to this article are
• the abrupt and vigorous change of the climate since about 1960, by contrast to the mild and gradual warming since the beginning of the Industrial Era, a period of adaptation after the cold Little Ice Age
• the identification of the temporal coincidence of the initiation of the severe climate change in the 1960s with the bomb tests associated with geochemical anomalies and steady temperature increase,
• the outrageous rate of CO2 emission, five times higher than similar extreme events in the geological past,
• the function of the Southern Ocean both as sink and as source of CO2 with prevailing outgassing currently,
• the heat engine along the boundary of the Antarctica Lithospheric Plate which stimulates upwelling and causes widespread continental warming of the West Antarctic climate, confirmed since 1958.
Therefore, apart from the Greenhouse Effect, we are currently confronted with the Nuclear Bomb Effect, a much more severe likelihood. It is not argued that the Bomb Effect is a proven fact, but only that there are strong indications for it and therefore it is an emergency for the scientific community to accelerate the investigations by absolute priority, which requires significant international support.
The evidence for the climatic change predominantly is based on measurements of the temperature globally and the increase of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the oceans. The relevant data are reconsidered based on the latest results and their current interpretation. Multiple time series are correlated, including the temperature, the greenhouse gases, the isotopic values of the radiocarbon (14C) and the stable isotope 13C. Furthermore, it is suggested that field surveys and modeling applications in the latest couple of years indicate that the Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica is very likely a source of carbon dioxide from deep oceanic waters in tandem with CO2 intake at the ocean surface from the atmosphere. It is not considered a coincidence that the increase of temperature and the geochemical anomalies start simultaneously with the nuclear bomb spike, approximately in 1960, as highlighted in the following.
The temperature increase is still in the expected range of warming after the cold period of the Little Ice age from 1570 to 1900 AD in the Northern Hemisphere. However, the CO2 increase is beyond any geological record, continues, and will persist so for some time, even after zeroing the fossil fuel burning. The reason is that a proportion of the CO2 in the atmosphere comes from sequestered gases in the ocean which travel southwards along the Global Overturning Circulation to join the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, where they upwell heated by the oceanic ridge of the Antarctic Lithospheric Plate and the elevated relief of the ridge.
It is not argued that the Bomb Effect is a proven fact, but only that there are reliable indications for it and therefore it is an emergency for the scientific community to accelerate the investigations in Antarctica by absolute priority which requires international support and coordination.

In order to adequately assess the ecological status of thermally stratified lakes based on chlorophyll, the sampling must cover all productive layers of the water column. Missing the deep chlorophyll maxima (DCM) that often occur in the meta- or hypolimnion of transparent lakes supported by sufficient illumination and good nutrient availability may cause serious underestimation of the productivity and lead to misclassification of the lake ecological status. There is no commonly accepted sampling design for stratified lakes, and various monitoring guides suggest controversial designs. Our aim was to find some robust criteria to assess the probability of occurrence of a DCM and estimate the differences in measured mean chlorophyll concentrations caused by various sampling designs. Our theoretical model showed that the probability of occurrence of a DCM increases with increasing water transparency and decreasing lake size. Empirical data from Italian and Estonian stratified lakes confirmed the results. Testing of different sampling designs on lakes with full measured chlorophyll profiles available showed that taking only surface layer samples will lead with a high probability to an underestimation of the chlorophyll concentration in the trophogenic layer. In order not to miss the Chl peak in stratified lakes, in most cases it would be more precautious not to limit the sampling to the well-mixed epilimnion but to extend it to the whole euphotic layer. Sampling the epilimnion instead of the euphotic zone could cause up to a 70% underestimation of the chlorophyll concentration, an error that would cause a misclassification of the lake by one or even two status classes in a 5-class assessment system. In most cases, the 2.5 * Secchi depths proved a suitable criterion of the sampling depth and only in the case of surface scums, would sampling of a 3 * Secchi depth layer be recommended in order not to miss the deep chlorophyll maximum.

The interannual variability in the tropical Indian Ocean, and in particular the Indian Ocean dipole mode (IODM), is investigated using both observations and a multi-decadal simulations performed by the coupled atmosphere–ocean general circulation model SINTEX. Overall, the characteristics of the simulated IODM are close to the features of the observed mode. Evidence of significant correlations between sea level pressure anomalies in the southeastern Indian Ocean and sea surface temperature anomalies in the tropical Indian and Pacific Oceans have been found both in observations and a multi-decadal simulation. In particular, a positive SLP anomaly in the southeastern part of the basin seems to produce favorable conditions for the development of an IODM event. The role played by the ocean dynamics both in the developing and closing phases of the IODM events is also investigated. Our results suggest that, during the developing phase, the heat content and SST variability associated with the IODM are influenced by a local response of the ocean to the winds, and a remote response with the excitation of Kelvin and Rossby waves. Ocean wave dynamics appear to be important also during the dying phase of the IODM, when equatorial downwelling Kelvin waves transport positive heat content anomalies from the western to the eastern part of the basin, suppressing the zonal heat content anomaly gradient. The results obtained from the model suggest a mechanism for the IODM. This mechanism is generally consistent with the characteristics of the observed IODM. Furthermore, it might give some clue in understanding the correlation between IODM and ENSO activity found both in the model and in the observations.

Tropical cyclones (TCs) Katrina and Rita moved as major hurricanes over energetic geostrophic ocean features in the Gulf of Mexico. Increased and reduced oceanic mixed layer (OML) cooling was measured following the passage of both storms over cyclonic and anticyclonic geostrophic relative vorticity ζg, respectively. This contrasting thermal response is investigated here in terms of the evolution of the storms’ near-inertial wave wake in geostrophic eddies. Observational data and ray-tracing techniques in realistic geostrophic flow indicate that TC-forced OML near-inertial waves are trapped in regions of negative ζg, where they rapidly propagate into the thermocline. These anticyclonic-rotating regimes coincided with the distribution of reduced OML cooling because rapid downward dispersion of near-inertial energy reduced the amount of kinetic energy available to increase vertical shears at the OML base. By contrast, TC-forced OML near-inertial waves were stalled in upper layers of cy...

• HTF flow rate has more significant influence on PCM-water tank than on conventional water tank. • Feasibility analysis to discuss employing PCM-water tank in CHP plants for heat supply. • More thermal energy can be released by PCM-water tank but with lower energy efficiency. • PCM-water tank shows obvious advantages when operating at small flow rate.

Thermocline-dwelling foraminifera calcify over a depth range of several hundred meters; analysis of individual shells therefore allows insight to the hydrography of the upper water column. We analyzed δ 18 O, δ 13 C, and Mg/Ca of individual tests of the planktonic foraminifera Globorotalia inflata from a sediment core (GeoB7926-2) obtained from 20°N in the eastern tropical Atlantic. To facilitate sample throughput, tests were cleaned before Mg/Ca analysis using a pipette robot. The eight samples came from five time periods with contrasting climate states. Median reconstructed temperatures were lowest during the warmth of the Bølling Allerød BA) (11.8°C), while highest temperatures (>14°C) were recorded during the cold periods of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), late Heinrich Stadial 1 (HS1), and the Younger Dryas (YD). Southward shift in the subtropical gyre during Northern Hemisphere cold periods and modulation by upwelling could explain the temperature change but not all of the salinity change. δ 18 O seawater-IVC indicated that salinity was higher than the global average during the LGM, with very high salinity excursions in HS1 and a smaller excursion in the YD. The upwelling signature was most strongly imprinted on range in δ 13 C. The large changes in salinity and δ 13 C between time slices cannot be explained by upwelling intensity but indicate the presence of a very saline water mass, with low δ 13 C, in the eastern North Atlantic subsurface during Northern Hemisphere cold periods.

This paper examined the features of three typical thermal storage systems including: 1) direct storage of heat transfer fluid in containers, 2) storage of thermal energy in a packed bed of solid filler material, with energy being carried in/out by a flowing heat transfer fluid which directly contacts the packed bed, and 3) a system in which heat transfer fluid flows through tubes that are imbedded into a thermal storage material which may be solid, liquid, or a mixture of the two. The similarity of the three types of thermal storage systems was discussed, and generalized energy storage governing equations were introduced in both dimensional and dimensionless forms. The temperatures of the heat transfer fluid during energy charge and discharge processes and the overall energy storage efficiencies were studied through solution of the energy storage governing equations. Finally, provided in the paper are a series of generalized charts bearing curves for energy storage effectiveness against four dimensionless parameters grouped up from many of the thermal storage system properties including dimensions, fluid and thermal storage material properties, as well as the operational conditions including mass flow rate of the fluid, and the ratio of energy charge and discharge time periods. Engineers can conveniently look up the charts to design and calibrate the size of thermal storage tanks and operational conditions without doing complicated individual modeling and computations. It is expected that the charts will serve as standard tools for thermal storage system design and calibration.