The waters of the oceans from all over the world are warming up, and we have known this for a while, so much so that we have already created several models that foresee what will happen if the temperatures should continue to rise to this rhythm.
The problem is that “this rhythm” could be higher than we thought so far: a new study published on Environmental Research Letters show that In the last forty years the rhythm that the oceans are warming up is more than quadrupledand the new models should take into account this quick and constant growth.
An immense bathtub. The best summary of the results of the study comes directly from the first author, Chris Merchant of the University of Reading, who explained: «Imagine the oceans as a bathtub. In the eighties, the hot water tap was only partially opened and slowly warmed the ocean waters. Now someone has opened the tap more and the heating has taken speed“.
In numerical terms this means that the results of the study, which compared the temperatures of the oceans and their growth rhythm from 1985 to today, indicate that until the late eighties the temperatures of the oceans were increasing by 0.06 ° C per decade, While In the last ten years the increase has risen to 0.27 ° C.
Who opened the tap? The cause of this dizzying increase in the heating rhythm is the energy imbalance of the entire earth: there is more solar energy that is absorbed by the planet than what can “escape” in space. The causes? The usual: greenhouse gasesand the fact that, With less and less snow, the earth reflects less and less sunlight in space. This accelerated in heating is already showing its effects: Between 2023 and 2024, the global temperatures of the oceans reached record values for 450 consecutive days.
The study ends with the consideration that all the calculations we have made on the consequences of the heating of the oceans must be redone, taking into account this increase in rhythm: the scenarios that are obtained risk being even more catastrophic than we already know.
