Greenhouse gases may steal oxygen from the oceans

Greenhouse gases may steal oxygen from the oceans

Wednesday, 28 January 2009 14:55

Continous emissions of greenhouse gases may slowly but dramatically impoverish the oceans of oxygen, with negative effects that could continue for thousands of years in life of fishes and other sea animals.
This is the scenery resulting from the simulations drawn in the web edition of the scientific journal Nature Geoscience and elaborated by Gary Shaffer's Danish team of Copenaghen University. In the scholars' opinion the oceans' impoverishment may be an effect of global warming. This could become a real fact in the next 100,000 years if a drastic reduction of fossil fuels is not implemented soon.
Shaffer's team took into account two situations related to emmissions of fossil fuels, and both simulations revealed a loss of oxygen in the oceans’ surface. As a consequence, the process that now rapidly brings in depth the superficial and oxygenised waters will be much slower.