The quiet crossing of ocean tipping points
- 1. Geophysical Institute, University of Bergen, 5020 Bergen, Norway; Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, University of Bergen, 5020 Bergen, Norway
- 2. Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, 10691 Stockholm, Swe
- 3. Rossby Centre, Swedish Meteorological andHydrological Institute, 60176 Norrköping, Sweden
- 4. Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement, Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, 91191Gif-sur-Yvette cedex, France
- 5. Institute of Biogeochemistry and Pollutant Dynamics, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, 8092Zürich, Switzerland
- 6. Pacific Centre for the Environment and Sustainable Development, The University of the South Pacific, Suva, Fiji
- 7. NorwegianMeteorological Institute, 0371 Oslo, Norway; The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, 0271 Oslo, Norway
- 8. Climate and EnvironmentalPhysics, Physics Institute, University of Bern, 3012 Bern, Switzerland; Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
- 9. School of Architecture, Computing and Engineering, University of East London, E16 2RD, London, United Kingdom
- 10. ArcticMonitoring and Assessment Programme Secretariat, 9296 Tromsø, Norway
Description
Anthropogenic climate change profoundly alters the ocean’s environmental conditions, which, in turn,impact marine ecosystems. Some of these changes are happening fast and may be difficult to reverse.The identification and monitoring of such changes, which also includes tipping points, is an ongoing andemerging research effort. Prevention of negative impacts requires mitigation efforts based on feasibleresearch-based pathways. Climate-induced tipping points are traditionally associated with singular cata-strophic events (relative to natural variations) of dramatic negative impact. High-probability high-impactocean tipping points due to warming, ocean acidification, and deoxygenation may be more fragmentedboth regionally and in time but add up to global dimensions. These tipping points in combination withgradual changes need to be addressed as seriously as singular catastrophic events in order to prevent thecumulative and often compounding negative societal and Earth system impacts.
Files
Heinze2021, The quiet crossing of ocean tipping points.pdf
Additional details
Funding
- European Commission
- COMFORT - Our common future ocean in the Earth system – quantifying coupled cycles of carbon, oxygen, and nutrients for determining and achieving safe operating spaces with respect to tipping points 820989
- Swiss National Science Foundation
- Climate and Environmental Physics: Modeling Global Biogeochemical Cycles in the Earth System (bgcCEP) 200020_172476