Preview

Research Paper On Thermohaline

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
465 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Research Paper On Thermohaline
The thermohaline current is the most important current system on this planet because of its important driving forces of the planet.

Why is it named Thermohaline?
The thermohaline has this name because it consists of general oceanic circulation controlled by the differences in temperature and salinity. Salinity refers to the total amount of dissolved salts in grams that are present in one kilogram of sea water, for example sodium and chloride. ‘Thermo’ comes from the use of heat in the process and ‘haline’ represents table salt, also known as halite.
Where does it travel?
How fast does the Thermohaline travel?
The process of the thermohaline circulation is extremely slow moving, going at the speed of 10 centimetres per second at the most.
…show more content…
The water involved in the thermohaline current is warmed by the sun which then transports heat and water to a higher latitude. Once the water cools down at the higher latitudes, it sinks back down because of the density of the cold water. Depending on the temperature of the water, it has the ability to chill or heat the air around them which affects the temperature and weather of the certain area.
What is its role?
The thermohaline circulation contributes largely in providing warm water and heat to Polar Regions. It also transports volumes of cold, salty water from the North Atlantic back to the equator where it gets heated up again. If this process were to be interrupted, the disrupted flow of the thermohaline current would dramatically alter regional and even global patterns of heat transfer because when the water in stops moving, the equator will become hot leaving the Polar Regions cold.
What is it doing?
What drives this current and how does it work?
The thermohaline current is partly driven by the two attributes, salinity and temperature. The difference between the densities of the two masses of water, provided from the ocean, allows the circulation to flow. The current is also partly driven by wind and tidal forces but is difficult to estimate their role in the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Nt1330 Unit 3 Quiz

    • 2190 Words
    • 9 Pages

    Heat is transferred from the Sun-warmed surface of the Earth to the cooler overlying troposphere via…

    • 2190 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nt1310 Unit 1 Assignment

    • 711 Words
    • 3 Pages

    All currents in the northern hemisphere move in a clockwise direction, while in the southern hemisphere they move in an anti-clockwise direction. Suprisngly landmasses can be responsible for changing the course of a current. Differences in temperature and salinity are also responsible for the movement of ocean water. In the equatorial region, ocean water gets more heated than in the cold polar regions. This makes the water “light”. Water in the polar regions is cold and heavy, so it sinks and flows towards the equator. The light upper layers of water are thus forced to move towards the poles where they get cooled. Some effects are winds blowing. Winds blowing over a warm current can become warm, and at the same time, pick up moisture, as warm winds are able to retain more moisture. Therefore, the wind that reaches the land brings down the temperature and can cause heavy rain. The western coast of Europe for example, is one. Winds blow cold and dry air. They help to bring down the temperatures in places, which would have been much hotter. The California current which is cold, which flows along the western coast of the U.S, makes the region much cooler than other places in the west coast on…

    • 711 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    (b) Cool currents deflect isotherms equatorward, whereas warm currents deflect them poleward (Hess, 2014, p 101). Cool currents produce the greatest isothermal bends in the warm season (Hess, 2014, p 101).…

    • 664 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Therm Eze

    • 1258 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Thermo-Pad is a heat storage device that utilizes the science of super cooled fluids to produce heat. If you have ever watched a cold bottle of pop freeze when opened, you have experienced the instant phase change of a super cooled…

    • 1258 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Leeuwin Current

    • 1194 Words
    • 5 Pages

    One of the most important influences that the Leeuwin Current has on marine ecosystems is the water temperature. Continental shelf waters off the coast of Western Australia are some four degrees warmer than other continents of the same latitude (http://www.per.marine.csiro.au/public/oceanography/regional/currents.html). This…

    • 1194 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    5. How do warm currents become heated? How do cool currents become cooled? Water is an enormously efficient heat-sink. Solar heat absorbed by bodies of water during the day, or in the summer, is released at night, or in winter. But the heat in the ocean is also circulating. Temperature & Salinity control the sinking of surface water to the deep ocean, which affects long-term climate change.…

    • 697 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    wderfeqrferf

    • 312 Words
    • 1 Page

    - Based on my observations in the lab, what I think happens to the majority of water at the poles is the water freezes that is because water is the only molecule that will not sink. Making water become ice.…

    • 312 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Tide Waves Research Paper

    • 291 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Winds and currents move the surface of the water causing waves. The gravitational attraction of the moon causes the oceans to bulge in the direction of the moon. Another bulge occurs on the opposite side because the Earth is also being pulled toward the moon and away from the water on the far side. Ocean levels fluctuate daily as the sun, the moon, and the earth interact. As the moon travels around the earth and as they, together, travel around the sun the combined gravitational forces cause the oceans to rise and fall.…

    • 291 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    * Salt works by lowering the freezing temperature of water. Salt water needs to reach a colder temperature than pure water to freeze. This is why salted ice on roads that are near the freezing temperature of pure water (32 degrees Fahrenheit) will melt and not refreeze immediately. The ice forms very salty water that will not freeze unless…

    • 639 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    I high amount of direct sunlight in this area yields the warmest temperatures. Hadley cells are driven by the direct sunlight as well. This region is in the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ), which is at the convergence of two Hadley cells. This is where air rises due to direct solar radiation, which causes water vapor to fall back to Earth as rain.…

    • 314 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Phase Change Lab Essay

    • 974 Words
    • 4 Pages

    A question that could be asked would be where all of this energy comes from in order to change the state of the water…

    • 974 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ap environmental

    • 291 Words
    • 2 Pages

    · What effect does Earths rotation have on atmospheric circulation and ocean currents? Unequal heating of the Earth by the Sun, atmospheric convection currents, the rotation of the Earth and the Coriolis effect, Earth's orbit around the sun on a tilted axis, and ocean currents. The tilt of the Earth's axis of rotation causes the seasonal changes in temperature and percipitation as earth orbits the Sun.…

    • 291 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the regions of western Canada east of the mountain ranges of British Columbia and north of the 60th parallel, January weather is usually found to be frigidly cold. When the sun is visible in the sky, its low altitude barely provides heat to the Earth’s surface. Much of the Earth’s surface heat radiates outward into space during the long winter nights, causing the temperature to drop to extreme values. Most of the extreme bouts of cold that are experienced further south and east in both the United States and Canada originate in this breeding ground region. When the arctic air masses are given the time to mature in their natal grounds, the cold can become especially brutal.…

    • 1554 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hurricane Harvey Essay

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages

    For starters, the cause of the cold phase. When we burn coal, aerosol particles are released. These particles are reflective of sunlight, so much of the sun’s light is reflected back to space before it reaches the ocean causing the water’s temperature to cool. However, the U.S. and Europe have instigated cleaner air regulations which have decreased the amount of aerosol particles and allowed the light to reach and warm the ocean.…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The reduction of large-scale mixing of water can cause the thermohaline circulation to shut down throughout the ocean. The thermohaline circulation is important for the ocean's biota as it brings nutrient-rich deep water up to the surface. Without this circulation of the oceans, Global temperatures would be determined almost completely by latitude. Europe would freeze without the warmth from the Gulf Stream. Melting of the polar ice caps could release a large quantity of freshwater into the ocean, which could slow or prevent normal thermohaline mixing and would affect the currents in various places around the world. In earth’s history, worldwide thermohaline circulation has shut down and recovered in the past, but this shut down still causes global climate to switch from warm to cold several times over. If an event like this were to happen in current day, massive crop failures would ensue in many places in the northern hemisphere. The thermohaline circulation is not likely to be disturbed if global warming is limited to 1°C or 2°C, but anything much higher could lead to a shut down of the thermohiline circulation…

    • 2140 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Good Essays