come 20 years of heat

From 20 years ago, we were able to observe drastic climatic changes that could cause a sharp rise in temperatures. The prediction is contained in research published on Nature by the University of Washington group coordinated by Ka-Kit Tung. What is going on? The circulation of the South Atlantic (also known as Amoc – Southern Circulation Atlantic Circulation ), which carries hot water to the north and the cold to South, slows down and the phenomenon can cause a decisive climate warming in the next four decades. The most recent negative peak was recorded from 2004 to 2010, when the attenuation was 10 times greater than expected

Atlantic traffic weakened

The study shows that the weakening of This circulation, which consists of a current system that includes the Gulf system, is part of its natural cycle. The Amoc works as a gigantic "treadmill": the warm water of the Gulf of Mexico is transported north, to Greenland, Iceland and the Norwegian Sea . Once here the mbades of water cool, become denser and go further. At this time, the current changes direction and transports cold water to the tropics. In short, research shows that this system of currents is moving from its fast phase to the slowest phase and this has implications for global warming. In its fastest phase, Amoc removes more CO2 from the atmosphere and accumulates it in depth, trapping it for very long periods of at least a thousand years. The relaxation of this activity can generate, as mentioned, a strong global warming.

"These data support a recent hypothesis advanced, namely that the weakening of this circulation has implications for the sequestration of CO2 present in the atmosphere," points out the oceanographer Alessandro Crisis, of the National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics (Ogs) of Trieste. "Amoc transforms warm waters into colder and colder waters, which absorb CO2 and sink"

As in the movies

It seems that the apocalyptic scenario described by the film of 2004 "The Day After Tomorrow" The catastrophic blockbuster in which the Earth faces a sudden glaciation due to the blockade of the Gulf Stream. A movie full of special effects, but if the phenomenon were to continue, Western Europe would suffer from summer heat waves and severe winters becoming more extreme. Sea levels would rise rapidly on the east coast of the United States and tropical rains could disappear.