Tag: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Super HD View of Global Carbon Dioxide
NASA scientists have a new super HD view of how carbon dioxide in the air moves around the world with the winds. They used an ultra-high-resolution computer model 64 times greater than typical climate models. Each pixel grid size is four miles wide.
During late summer, forest fires in Africa produce plumes of CO2.
During late autumn to winter, the bright reds show the three major sources of fossil fuel burning: the eastern U.S., Europe and China. The winds blow much of the CO2 towards the North Pole.
Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Ocean Circulation: Important Role in Absorbing Carbon from the Atmosphere
The oceans play a significant role in absorbing greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide, and heat from the atmosphere. This absorption can help mitigate the early effects of human-emissions of carbon dioxide.
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation acts as a conveyor belt of ocean water from Florida to Greenland. Along the journey north, water near the surface absorbs greenhouse gases, which sink down as the water cools near Greenland. In this way, the ocean effectively buries the gases deep below the surface.
Read the related story, NASA-MIT study evaluates efficiency of oceans as heat sink, atmospheric gases sponge.
Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center