Introduction
Tymon Zielinski, Marcin Weslawski, Karol Kuliński, Tomasz Petelski
and Beata Szymczycha
Climate has a large influence on marine environments. Thus, any shifts in global or
regional climate result in more or less significant changes in structure and functioning of the marine ecosystems. The recently observed high anthropogenic
pressure causes that climate changes and thus also alterations in marine ecosystems
are faster and more distinct than before. Moreover, most of the available predictions
suggest that these changes will be observed also in the future and their amplitude
may even increase (IPCC 2013).
There are a variety of ways to facilitate understanding how various drivers, both
natural and anthropogenic substances and processes that alter the Earth’s energy
budget, contribute to climate change. In principle, observations of the climate
response to a single factor could directly show the impact of that factor, or climate
models could be used to study the impact of any single factor.
Radiative forcing (RF) quantifies the change in energy fluxes caused by changes
in these drivers (IPCC 2013). Atmospheric aerosols are among the most crucial
drivers which effect the RF in the atmosphere, through cloud adjustments, which
due to aerosols, is –0.9 [–1.9 to −0.1] W m
−2 (medium confidence). This results in a
negative forcing from most aerosols and a positive contribution from black carbon
absorption of solar radiation. There is high confidence that aerosols and their
interactions with clouds have offset a substantial portion of global mean forcing
from well-mixed greenhouse gases. They continue to contribute the largest
uncertainty to the total RF estimate (IPCC 2013).
Aerosol particles affect atmospheric processes. After deposition to the sea
surface, they affect processes in sea water. Their effects in the atmosphere are very
T. Zielinski (&) Á M. Weslawski Á K. Kuliński Á T. Petelski Á B. Szymczycha
Institute of Oceanology Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
e-mail: tymon@iopan.gda.pl
T. Zielinski Á K. Kuliński
Centre for Polar Studies National Leading Research Centre, 60 Będzińska Street,
41-200 Sosnowiec, Poland
© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015
T. Zielinski et al. (eds.), Impact of Climate Changes on Marine Environments,
GeoPlanet: Earth and Planetary Sciences, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-14283-8_1
1
Tymon Zielinski, Marcin Weslawski, Karol Kuliński, Tomasz Petelski
and Beata Szymczycha
Climate has a large influence on marine environments. Thus, any shifts in global or
regional climate result in more or less significant changes in structure and functioning of the marine ecosystems. The recently observed high anthropogenic
pressure causes that climate changes and thus also alterations in marine ecosystems
are faster and more distinct than before. Moreover, most of the available predictions
suggest that these changes will be observed also in the future and their amplitude
may even increase (IPCC 2013).
There are a variety of ways to facilitate understanding how various drivers, both
natural and anthropogenic substances and processes that alter the Earth’s energy
budget, contribute to climate change. In principle, observations of the climate
response to a single factor could directly show the impact of that factor, or climate
models could be used to study the impact of any single factor.
Radiative forcing (RF) quantifies the change in energy fluxes caused by changes
in these drivers (IPCC 2013). Atmospheric aerosols are among the most crucial
drivers which effect the RF in the atmosphere, through cloud adjustments, which
due to aerosols, is –0.9 [–1.9 to −0.1] W m
−2 (medium confidence). This results in a
negative forcing from most aerosols and a positive contribution from black carbon
absorption of solar radiation. There is high confidence that aerosols and their
interactions with clouds have offset a substantial portion of global mean forcing
from well-mixed greenhouse gases. They continue to contribute the largest
uncertainty to the total RF estimate (IPCC 2013).
Aerosol particles affect atmospheric processes. After deposition to the sea
surface, they affect processes in sea water. Their effects in the atmosphere are very
T. Zielinski (&) Á M. Weslawski Á K. Kuliński Á T. Petelski Á B. Szymczycha
Institute of Oceanology Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
e-mail: tymon@iopan.gda.pl
T. Zielinski Á K. Kuliński
Centre for Polar Studies National Leading Research Centre, 60 Będzińska Street,
41-200 Sosnowiec, Poland
© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015
T. Zielinski et al. (eds.), Impact of Climate Changes on Marine Environments,
GeoPlanet: Earth and Planetary Sciences, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-14283-8_1
1