A unique 'natural laboratory' in the Mediterranean Sea is revealing the effects of rising carbon dioxide levels on life in the oceans. The results show a bleak future for marine life as ocean acidity rises, and suggest that similar lowering of ocean pH levels may have been responsible for massive extinctions in the past....

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Scientists are gaining a deeper understanding of marine mammal travel patterns using a large-scale tracking network. A new Public Library of Science (PLoS) collection, created in conjunction with the Pacific Ocean Shelf Tracking (POST) Program and the Census of Marine Life (CoML), will highlight the variety of ways scientists are using this large POST network to trace marine animal movement in the Northeast Pacific Ocean....

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NOAA's navigation response teams, part of the Office of Coast Survey, conduct hydrographic surveys of the ocean floor, monitoring for changes in depth or hazards below the surface of the water that could pose great danger to vessel traffic above.

Six navigation teams are strategically located around the country, ready to collect data needed to inform officials of navigational hazards and to help the U.S. Coast Guard find alternative routes for commercial and military ships. NOAA also uses the survey data to update NOAA's national suite of nautical charts—"roadmaps" for mariners. For more information:
Office of Coast Survey
Navigation Response Teams (Diving Deeper podcast, 5.19.10)
Hydrographic Surveying
NOAA's Navigation Response Teams
Rapid Response for Disasters

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A relatively new type of El Niño, which has its warmest waters in the central-equatorial Pacific Ocean, rather than in the eastern-equatorial Pacific, is becoming more common and progressively stronger, according to a new study by NASA and NOAA. The research may improve our understanding of the relationship between El Niños and climate change, and has potentially significant implications for long-term weather forecasting....

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Imagine loosening the screw-top of a soda bottle and hearing the carbon dioxide begin to escape. Then imagine taking the cap off quickly, and seeing the beverage foam and fizz out of the bottle. Then, imagine the pressure equalizing and the beverage being ready to drink. Marine scientists say that something similar happened over a 1,000 year period after the end of the last ice age....

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Meet Darlene Finch, Mid-Atlantic Regional Coordinator for the NOAA Coastal Services Center...

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Sea level will likely be 30-70 centimeters higher by 2100 than at the start of the century, even if all but the most aggressive geo-engineering schemes are undertaken to mitigate the effects of global warming and greenhouse gas emissions are stringently controlled, according to new findings by international research group of scientists from England, China and Denmark....

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Survey towers were used by U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey surveyors from the mid-1800s through the 1980s to obtain the clear lines-of-sight needed to conduct the surveys that are the backbone of our nation’s spatial reference framework. One of the most enduring and widely used types of towers was the Bilby Tower, designed by Jasper Bilby in 1926....

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In the beginning, the primeval seas were probably only slightly salty. But over time, as rain fell to the Earth and ran over the land, breaking up rocks and transporting their minerals to the ocean, the ocean has become saltier.

Rain replenishes freshwater in rivers and streams, so they don’t taste salty. However, the water in the ocean collects all of the salt and minerals from all of the rivers that flow into it.

It is estimated that the rivers and streams flowing from the United States alone discharge 225 million tons of dissolved solids and 513 million tons of suspended sediment annually to the ocean. Throughout the world, rivers carry an estimated four billion tons of dissolved salts to the ocean annually.

About the same tonnage of salt from ocean water probably is deposited as sediment on the ocean bottom and thus, yearly gains may offset yearly losses. In other words, the ocean today probably has a balanced salt input and output (and so the ocean is no longer getting saltier).

For more information:
Why is the ocean salty?
Salinity Data, National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC)



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Emissions of carbon dioxide are causing ocean acidification as well as global warming. Scientists have previously used computer simulations to quantify how curbing of carbon dioxide emissions would mitigate climate impacts. New computer simulations have now examined the likely effects of mitigation scenarios on ocean acidification trends. They show that both the peak year of emissions and post-peak reduction rates influence how much ocean acidity increases by 2100....

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