Volume 32, Number 2, Summer 1989
The Oceans
& Global Warming
• CO2 and the greenhouse effect
• The link between sea and air
• The effects of rising sea level
ISSN 0029-8182
Oceanus
The International Magazine of Marine Science and Policy
Volume 32, Number 2, Summer 1989
Frederic Golden, Acting Editor
T. M. Hawley, Assistant Editor
Sara L. Ellis, Editorial Assistant
Editorial Advisory Board
°0
1930
James M. Broadus, Director of the Marine Policy Center, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Henry Charnock, Professor of Physical Oceanography, University of Southampton, England
Gotthilf Hempel, Director of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar Research, West Germany
Charles D. Hollister, Vice-President and Associate Director for External Affairs, Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution
John Imbrie, Henry L. Doherty Professor of Oceanography, Brown University
John A. Knauss, Professor of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island
Arthur E. Maxwell, Director of the Institute for Geophysics, University of Texas
Timothy R. Parsons, Professor, Institute of Oceanography, University of British Columbia, Canada
Allan R. Robinson, Gordon McKay Professor of Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Harvard University
David A. Ross, Chairman of the Department of Geology and Geophysics, and Sea Grant Coordinator,
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Published by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Guy W. Nichols, Chairman of the Board of Trustees
John H. Steele, President of the Corporation
Charles A. Dana, III, President of the Associates
Craig E. Dorman, Director of the Institution
The views expressed in Oceanus are those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect those of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Permission to photocopy for
internal or personal use or the
internal or personal use of
specific clients is granted by
Oceanus magazine to libraries
and other users registered
with the Copyright Clearance
Center (CCC), provided that
the base fee of $2.00 per copy
of the article, plus .05 per
page is paid directly to CCC,
21 Congress Street, Salem, MA
01970. Special requests should
be addressed to Oceanus
magazine.
ISSN 0029-8182/83 $2. 00 + .05
Editorial correspondence: Oceanus magazine, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution,
Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543. Telephone: (508) 548-1400, extension 2386.
Subscription correspondence, U.S. and Canada: All orders should be addressed to Oceanus Subscriber
Service Center, P.O. Box 641 9, Syracuse, N.Y. 13217. Individual subscription rate: $22 a year; Libraries
and institutions, $50. Current copy price, $5.50; 25 percent discount on current copy orders for 5 or
more; 40 percent discount to bookstores and newsstands. Please make checks payable to the
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Subscribers outside the U.S. and Canada, please write: Oceanus, Cambridge University Press, The
Edinburgh Building, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 2RU, England. Individual subscription rate:
£20 a year; Students, £17; Libraries and Institutions, £37. Single copy price, £9. Please make checks
payable to Cambridge University Press.
When sending change of address, please include mailing label. Claims for missing numbers from
the U.S. and Canada will be honored within 3 months of publication; overseas, 5 months.
ive
me
1930
yourself
now!
Oceanus
Domestic Subscription Order Form: U.S. & Canada*
Pie.! mographic Insliliii
The International Magazine
of Marine Science and Pohc y
Publish^.
Oceanographic Institution
;nv suhsc nption to OCI
lndi\ idi.
D <
n i
Institu'
D o
'd.
•.1 prepavmi
Please send MY Subscription to:
Please send a GIFT Subscription to:
Name
Street address
irmti
City environment may offer us
>/ng with the challenges of
satellite view of the Culf Stream and its eddies off the
. .ortheast coast of the United States. Light gray indicates
colder temperatures, djrker tones are warmer waters. White
features are clouds. (Courtesy of NASA)
by John H. Steele
the Oceans
sudden changes in
some lessons in
global warming.
From what we hear on television and read in
the press, it seems that our present excesses -
from wholesale destruction of the rain forest to
widescale pollution of the atmosphere and
ocean — are the sole cause of the anticipated
changes in global climate. Yet, as I write this
article in my office on Cape Cod, I can't help but
reflect on the transitory nature of certain aspects
of our planet entirely unconnected with human
activities.
The Cape, for example, is nothing more
than a pile of rubble — though certainly a
beautiful one -left behind 10,000 years ago by a
retreating glacier, the remnants of the last ice
age. Similarly, as recently as a thousand years
ago, during a brief warm period unconnected
with any human intervention, Iceland, Green-
land, and Newfoundland were sites of thriving
European agricultural colonies, as well as the
preferred route to the New World. Closer to our
time, during the "Little Ice Age" (Oceanus Vol.
29, No. 4, pp. 38-39) of the 15th to the 19th
centuries, George Washington's troops shivered
at Valley Forge, and the Thames River in England
froze over every winter.
For the last century, there has been a
general warming trend but even that has
proceeded at an irregular pace, with falls as well
as rises in mean temperature (Figure 1). This
variability raises important questions: How much
of the change is natural? How much of it is of
our creation? Are we still escaping from that last
cold period, or do the recent changes in global
temperature portend an entirely new manmade
climate?
The physicists and chemists and those who
create simulated worlds on computers must try
to answer these questions. But for much of
mankind, if the predictions are correct, the
answers will appear locally or regionally in the
living part of their own environment as declining
forests, failing crops, and disappearing fish
stocks. Again, such climate-linked changes are
not new. The collapse of the Hanseatic League in
the 14th century may well have been associated
with the disappearance of herring from the
Baltic.
More Limited in Our Flexibility
In the past, societies confronted changes in their
food supply by either adapting to them or
migrating — an example of the latter being the
mass exodus from Ireland following the potato
famine of the mid-1 9th century. Now, however,
our flexibility is more limited.
In spite of our increased mobility as
John H. Steele is President of the Corporation of the
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and a Senior
Scientist at its Marine Policy Center, and has long
studied the food-chain dynamics of ocean ecosystems.
.-.»—. Annual mean
5-year mean
-0.8
1860 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000
Year
Figure 1. Variations in average temperature of the globe
(land and sea) expressed as departures from the mean
over the last 30 years.
individuals, thanks to the automobile and the
airplane, societies are more rigid and either
unwilling or unable to move; imagine, for
instance, how difficult it would be to shift a
major population center like metropolitan New
York. Also, as a technological society that sharply
alters its environment (by reshaping the land,
building extensively, and releasing wastes into
the atmosphere and seas), we ourselves have
become a major element in its physics and
biology -in effect, altering the equations.
Perhaps the most important aspect of the
impending climatic change, if we are to accept
the predictions, is its speed. We're told that it
will occur so rapidly as to make technical
solutions or cultural adaptation all but
impossible. In this respect, our situation differs
radically from that which confronted societies in
the past.
Time is the new, and in my view critical,
factor in global climate change. We need to
know how rapidly the changes will occur on
land, in the sea and air, and, of course, in human
behavior. What's more, in extracting these rates
from the complexity of environmental processes,
we must take into account their spatial
dimensions — that is, how large a region will be
affected by a particular change. This approach
allows us to use what I like to call space-time
diagrams to compare diverse parts of our
environment and help explain how they interact.
Possibly this approach can help teach us how to
cope with our changing world.
Let's consider weather. As we study our
space-time diagram (Figure 2), we can see the
progression from intense local short-lived
disturbances, such as tornadoes, up to the
circumglobal fronts (long waves, like the jet
stream) that undulate across North America and
bring changes in weather over almost the entire
country. Yet even on a global scale, weather
changes rapidly from week to week. Because of
this variability, prediction becomes virtually
impossible for periods beyond about two weeks
(except, of course, for seasonal changes).
How have terrestrial plants and animals
managed to survive the large variability in
climate? Plants have worked out a simple
solution for themselves. Generally, they have
much longer life spans than animals — on the
order of centuries or more in the case of some
trees — so they can bridge the short-term
fluctuations. Even the perennial grasses create a
soil environment that takes a long time to
develop but can then withstand year-to-year
changes.
In the past, animals (including our
ancestors) were closely linked to these longer
time scales through the availability of food
supplies. They flourished in times of feast, and
foundered in years of famine. To protect
themselves against the vagaries of weather, most
higher animals evolved certain defensive
strategies, such as warm-bloodedness, living in
burrows (or air-conditioned houses), and
producing fewer offspring but nurturing them
longer to ensure their survival.
In either case, the general solution to the
ecological problem of coping with short-term but
large-scale variability in weather was to live
longer-a Pritikin strategy, if you will -so that
over a lifetime these unpredictable elements can
be smoothed out. In my space and time scale
diagram, this is seen as the "distance" between
the physical regime and the biological response:
days to weeks for the former, years to centuries
for the latter.
But is longevity the only solution? Also,
where does climate enter into these relations?
The oceans offer some answers. First, consider
their physics. Although they are fluid like the
atmosphere with all the turbulent features we see
in the air, they operate on very different time
scales because water is much denser and more
viscous than air. The ocean's eddies -rings of
motion -correspond to cyclonic features in the
atmosphere, but whereas tropical storms have
lifetimes of days or at most weeks, eddies last for
many months. The great ocean gyres, like the
circulation of the North Atlantic, are similarly
Atmospheric Scales
Global -
10,000 -
1000 -
100km -
10km -
1 km -
Thunder
Storms
)ur
1 —
month
— — i —
decade
mi lie
century
day year
Figure 2. The space and time scales for weather events
and for the dominant aspects of terrestrial ecosystems.
An Oceanic
Conveyer Belt
Figure 3. The long-term (centuries) circulation of water through the deep oceans returning as surface movements.
(After Broecker et al., 1985)
long-lived. They take about a decade to
circumnavigate an ocean basin.
Finally, there is the exchange of the
ocean's warm surface layers with the cold deep
ocean a mile or more down. This has been
pictured as a global conveyor belt, driven by
cooling in the polar regions (Figure 3). The time
scale for this vertical exchange and circulation is
between a century and a millennium.
Thus, with their ranges of years, decades,
and even centuries, oceanic processes involve
time scales we now call "climate" (Figure 4a). It's
no wonder that life originated, not on land but in
the much more stable sea. Indeed, as our
reconnaissance of the solar system seems to
show, only the Earth has life. Dry planets are not
habitable; oceans are needed because they are
the dominant reservoirs for water and carbon,
the major components of living organisms.
Irregularities in the Oceanic Flywheel
Certainly, the oceans smooth out the daily and
seasonal cycles so that, in the shorter term, we
find coastal areas the most desirable habitats. But
the tremendous heat capacity of the ocean and
its slow dynamics also mean that its movements,
both horizontal and vertical, act like a huge
flywheel driving the world's climate at a relatively
steady pace. Even so, this flywheel develops
irregularities.
During the last ice age, the conveyor belt
was generally slowed down and certainly was
stopped in the Arctic. And even at much shorter,
year-to-year scales, we're beginning to see that
natural phenomena like El Nino* can change the
circulation of the tropical Pacific with dramatic
consequences for climate and food production in
Asia and the Americas. An El Nino event is now
considered responsible for the 1988 drought in
the Midwest. Eventually we'll probably be able to
predict such events six months ahead, but this is
still far short of making useful forecasts for the
next few decades.
Research is now under way to determine
the underlying ocean processes and the
feasibility of such long-term predictions. But
even with our best scientific efforts, it's possible
that, as with weather prediction, there may well
be an ultimate limit — of a few years rather than
decades — to our forecasting ability.
*A warmer and more southerly flow of water along the
Peru and Chile coast that acts almost like a blanket,
sharply curtailing the nutrient-rich upwelling there, and
dramatically reducing the highly productive anchovy
fishery. Because the warmer current often seemed to
appear around Christmastime, local fishermen named it
El Nino, Spanish for "the [Christ] Child." More
recently, it has been linked to a wider phenomenon
called the Southern Oscillation: a change in the
prevailing westerly trade winds across the Pacific,
characterized first by a buildup in their strength, then a
decline. As the winds diminish, water that they
propeled westward "sloshes" back toward the west
coast of South America, causing an El Nino event. The
El Nino/Southern Oscillation process can create climatic
effects all around the Pacific rim, not just in Peru and
Chile (Oceanus Vol. 27, No. 2).
Ocean Scales
Global -
10.000 -
hour
month decade millenium
day year century
Figure 4a.
Global -
10,000 -
1000-
100 km -
10 km -
1 km-
Terrestrial Scales
month decade millenium
day year century
hour
Figure 4b.
In the meantime, what can we say about
the response of living systems to this kind of
variability in the sea? The oceans provide a
fascinating example of a completely different
"solution" to the problem of living with
uncertainty. Consider the planktonic plants in the
open sea, the basic units of production at the
bottom of the food chain. Microscopic in size,
they have lifetimes of hours or days (compared
to centuries for forests). Many of the dominant
herbivores, the small crustaceans that graze on
these tiny plants, live for a few months, about
the lifetime of the eddies; and the pelagic fish,
such as herring or tuna, which feed on these
smaller creatures, live for several years or even
decades and make use of the local or ocean
gyres for their migration patterns. Thus, the
space and time scales for organisms living in the
open sea correspond closely to those of their
physical environment (Figure 4a) — the greater the
area they occupy in their lifetime, the longer they
live.
Furthermore, their modes of reproduction
are generally very different from land animals.
Most open-ocean animals expend their energy on
producing a large number of eggs — thousands to
millions — but once released and fertilized, these
are at the mercy of the environment and must be
dispersed or carried by currents to favorable
areas for feeding, growth, and survival.
There are many reasons for these
alternatives to the life processes on land.
Changes in sea temperature, for example, are
much more predictable and less variable on time
scales of weeks and months compared to the
changes in temperatures over land. Oceanic life-
forms don't have to work against gravity the way
terrestrial ones do since the ocean's viscosity is
greater than air's, and passive movement with
the currents is less energetically demanding than
directed movement through the water. For such
reasons, life in the sea has evolved a quite
different response to the problem of dealing with
environmental uncertainty.
It's intriguing to use these space-time
diagrams to illustrate the two quite different ways
that marine and terrestrial life-forms meet the
challenge. When you compare Figures 2 and 4b,
you see that land organisms separate the time
scales as much as possible to avoid the variable
physical effects on land, while marine organisms
couple the scales closely to utilize the dynamics
of the marine system.
Enlarged Impacts, Speeded Up Change
What has humanity done from the perspective of
space and time scales? Until the last century, our
presence lay well within the context of the
"natural" world, as depicted in Figure 2. But as
this century has progressed, we have enlarged
the scale of our impacts and speeded up the
process of change. The most pervasive and best
known changes are in the increased concen-
trations of the "greenhouse" gases, especially
carbon dioxide. Changes in carbon dioxide levels
are, to be sure, not a new phenomenon. We
know from ice cores and other studies that
concentrations of this gas were low during the
last ice age. What may be new is the faster rate
of change resulting from our burning of fossil
carbon accumulated over millions of years.
Plowing the soil, although hallowed by
custom, is the most unnatural act we perform on
our environment. It always disturbs, and can
quickly destroy, the work of nature over centu-
ries. Acceptable in moderation, disruption of this
organic matrix is now altering the appearance of
the globe in tropical forests and at the edge of
deserts. The latter process — desertification — is
affecting a whole region of Africa called the
Sahel. We can see these changes from space but
cannot yet decide how much of this change is
"climate" and how much is the immediate impact
of expanding human populations.
And then, of course there is the multitude
of new industrial processes that alter the world in
multifarious ways. The chlorofluorocarbons
(CFCs) are just one example of our capability to
create a new global impact — an attack on
atmosphere's protective ozone shield, which
screens out lethal x-rays. The damage was done
8
within one or two decades but will probably last
a century.
If we take these diverse human activities at
their present levels, we can define new positions
for the scales at which we are interacting with
our world (Figure 5). This is merely one way of
expressing our general perception that we are
playing an increasing role in changing the Earth.
But the method of presentation also permits us
to compare these rates with those of the
atmosphere and the ocean (Figure 6). I have
simplified the earlier discussion to present
"weather" as the short-term control by the
atmosphere, and "climate" as the consequence
of long-period variability dominated by changes
in the oceans. El Nino is included as our best
known and understood phenomenon, occurring
irregularly at intervals of 5 to 10 years and
apparently affecting a large part of the world.
But what this approach allows us to portray
is the consequences of our recent activities.
Those that stem from industrial innovation, like
the introduction of new chemicals such as CFCs,
may occur rapidly, but others, like effects of
expanded farming, grow out of the increase in
scale (examples: the many acres of rain forest
taken under cultivation daily through clear-
cutting and slash-and-burn agriculture). By this
reckoning, increasing spatial scale and more
rapid change are additive factors in shifting to
the left or upwards the place of human activities
in the space-time graph. They have now moved
into the region we have defined as ocean
climate.
Apparently, we are creating not merely a
quantitative change in our environment, but a
qualitatively different relationship as well. Instead
of a social and ecological system that can absorb
the variability of shorter climate scales, we now
have a system where the scales overlap. We're
now closely coupled to our environment by
many different processes.
Can we manage such a relationship? Can
we slow it down? There is much to be said for
doing all we can to decrease the rate of our
Global -i
10,000 -
1000 -
100 km -
10km -
1 km -
hour month decade millenium
day year century
Figure 6. A comparison of the space and time scales for
land, sea, and human processes.
advance (if that is the appropriate word). But
"back to nature" is not practicable in the context
of my space-time diagram. Small, and slow, may
be beautiful; and parts of the highly cultivated
European countryside are examples of this
philosophy at work. But the rapidly expanding
cities on every continent are not going to
disappear. And so we must learn how to survive,
closely coupled to an unpredictable world.
The analogy with marine communities is
far-fetched, to be sure, but at least they offer
examples of ecosystems that absorb and utilize
the variability and unpredictable elements in
their environment. We have yet to learn how to
accept not merely the good surprises such as the
"green revolution" but also the droughts and
even the Chernobyls. We ought to try to look
ahead to the next century, even if we can't
expect a clear picture. And we must keep in
mind that a critical part of the story will lie in the
oceans.
Human Scales
Global -
10,000 -
1000-
100km -
10 km
1 km -
hour
month
decade millenium
day year century
Figure 5. Present scales of human activity.
Selected References
Clark, W. C. 1985. Scales of climate impacts. Climatic Change 7:
5-27.
CLIMAP. 1976. The surface of the ice age earth. Science 191: 1131-
1137.
Davis, M. B. 1981. Quarternary history and the stability of forest
communities. In West, Shugart, and Botkin, eds. Forest
Succession, Concepts and Application. Springer-Verlag, New
York.
Broecker, W. S., D. M. Peteet and O. Rind. 1985. Does the ocean-
atmosphere system have more than one stable mode of
operation? Nature 315: 21-26.
Glantz, M. 1987. Drought in Africa. Sci. Amer. 256: 34-40.
NASA. 1986. Earth System Science. National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, Washington, DC.
Steele, J.H. 1985. Comparison of marine and terrestrial ecological
systems. Nature 313: 355-358.
QBJon't buy land in New Orleans," warns John
D. Milliman, Senior Scientist at the Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). The veteran
researcher's comment stems from his knowledge
of how sea-level rise — an expected consequence
of global warming — will affect the habitability of
low-lying coastal regions around the world. In
the 21st century, waves now breaking on the
shores of Louisiana's coast could be lapping at
the doors of homes in the Big Easy. Miami is
another case in point. The first settlements in
that city were built on what little high ground
could be found, but today most of greater Miami
lies at or just above sea level on swampland
reclaimed from the Everglades. Water for its
three million residents is drawn from the
Biscayne aquifer that flows only feet below the
city streets. That the city exists and prospers is
due to what engineers call a "hydrologic
masterwork" of natural and artificial systems that
hold back swamp and sea.
Against a three-foot rise in ocean levels,
which is expected by the year 2050, the city's
only defense would be a costly system of sea
walls and dikes. But that might not be enough to
spare the city from insidious assault. Freshwater
floats atop salt water, so as sea levels rise the
water table would be pushed three feet closer to
the surface. The elaborate pumping and drainage
system that currently maintains the integrity of
the highly porous aquifer could be overwhelmed.
Roads would buckle, bridge abutments sink, and
land revert back to swamp.
Miami's experience would not be unique.
Large cities around the world — New Orleans,
New York, Venice, Bangkok, and Taipei, to name
a few — would face the prospect of inundation by
invading seas. For each, the choice would be
fight or flight.
Protecting infrastructure and water
supplies of coastal cities, not to mention saving
If sea levels rise as much as some scientists expect
because of global warming, vulnerable barrier islands
such as the one shown on the opposite page will be
among the first to be deluged. (Courtesy of the
National Geographic Society)
shorelines and wetlands, will require many
billions of dollars, perhaps even more than most
well-off nations could afford. Sea levels have only
gone up several inches over the last century, but
their rise is sure to accelerate in the coming
decades as global warming sets in motion an
expansion of ocean volume and a melting of
mountain glaciers and polar ice caps. While some
universal increase in sea level is now inevitable,
the rate and extent of change depends on
preemptive action adopted by society today.
The Expanding Ocean
Most scientists in the climate field now agree that
a global warming has begun. Its causes are by
now depressingly familiar: "greenhouse" gases
generated by human activity are accumulating in
the atmosphere and trapping the sun's radiant
heat. These gases include carbon dioxide and
nitrous oxides from the combustion of wood and
fossil fuels, chlorofluorocarbons (used as a
refrigerant and in industrial applications), and
methane (from ruminant animals, termites, and
rice paddies). Meanwhile, population pressures
in the Third World are forcing wholesale forest
clearing for fuel, farmland, and living space. The
result is fewer trees left to recapture the chief
greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide.
It is now all but certain that the delicate
balance between incoming sunlight and reflected
heat that keeps the Earth at a relatively constant
average temperature has been upset. What is not
certain is just how much higher the temperature
will go, and how quickly the increase will take
place. Estimates based on current trends project
that an average global rise of between three and
eight degrees Fahrenheit can be expected within
the next 40 years. [For a slightly more skeptical
view of such predictions, see article, pp. 61-64.]
As temperatures rise, the waters of the
Earth will expand. Glaciers and ice caps will melt.
Still-higher sea levels may occur if the warming
breaks loose such large frozen ice masses as the
West Antarctic sheet. If correct, the predicted
temperature changes would raise sea level by five
to seven feet over the next century. Some
climatologists now estimate that the rate of
37
increase will accelerate after 2050, reaching about
an inch per year.
The heat and dryness of the summer of
1988 drew attention to the withering effects
global warming could have on agricultural
productivity, but its most lasting legacy could be
the displacement of peoples, the abandonment
of entire delta regions, and the destruction of
vital coastal ecosystems by inundation.
Building the Great Seawalls
China's 1,500-mile Great Wall is considered the
largest construction project ever carried out, but
it may soon be superseded in several countries
by modern-day analogs: the "Great Seawalls." If
nothing is done to slow global warming, then
building structures to hold back the sea will
become essential, but their multibillion-dollar
price tags may be higher than even some well-to-
do countries can afford.
Nowhere is the battle against the sea more
actively engaged than in the Netherlands. The
Dutch are perhaps best known for their
achievements in building a nation on the deltas
of the Meuse, Rhine, and Scheldt rivers. And
well they should be: Without the carefully
maintained stretches of dikes (250 miles) and
sand dunes (120 miles) built by Holland's
engineers to hold back the sea, more than half
the country would be under water.
As the engineers know, the ocean doesn't
relinquish land easily. In early 1953, a storm
surge that hit the delta region caused an unpre-
cedented disaster. More than 100 miles of dikes
were breached, leading to the inundation of 600
square miles of land and the deaths of more than
1,800 people. In response, the Dutch government
put together the Delta Plan, a massive public
works project that took two decades and the
equivalent of six percent of the country's gross
national product each year to complete.
The Dutch continue to spend heavily to
keep their extensive system of dikes and pumps
in shape, and are now protected against storms
up to those with a probability of occurring once
in 10,000 years. But, due to sea-level rise, main-
taining this level of safety may require addi-
tional investments of up to $10 billion by 2040.
Large though these expenditures are, they
are trivial compared with what the United States,
with more than 19,000 miles of coastline, will
have to spend to protect Cape Cod, Long Island,
the Maryland, Massachusetts, and New Jersey
shores, North Carolina's Outer Banks, most of
Florida, the bayous of Louisiana, the Texas Gulf
Coast, and the San Francisco Bay Area.
Even so, industrial countries are in a far
better financial position to protect their coastal
regions than are developing nations. Bangladesh,
for instance, can ill afford to match the Dutch
Jodi L Jacobson is a senior researcher at the
Worldwatch Institute, specializing in environmental and
demographic issues. This article originally appeared in
the January-February 1989 issue of World Watch.
mile for mile in seawalls. But its danger is no less
real. The cyclones originating in the Bay of
Bengal before and after the monsoon season
already devastate the southern part of
Bangladesh on a regular basis. Storm surges 18
feet higher than normal can reach as far as 125
miles inland and cover a third of the country.
In addition to lifting the ocean's level,
global warming is likely to increase the frequency
of these tropical storms. When added to the
ongoing alteration of the combined delta of the
Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Meghna rivers — the
Bengal Delta — by natural processes and human
activity, these conditions may wreak so much
This dike on the island of Walcheren in the Netherlands
is one of the best of its kind, but even it could not
hold back the rising sea. (Bettmann Archive)
damage that Bangladesh as it is known today may
virtually cease to exist.
The Danger of Subsidence
Low-lying delta regions, vulnerable even to slight
increases in sea level, will be among the first
land areas lost to inundation. Residents of these
regions are joined in activities that amount to a
lowering of defenses. By overpumping
groundwater and interfering with the natural
ground building that rivers achieve through
sedimentation, they are causing the land to sink.
In a vicious circle, the more populated these
regions become, the more likely this
subsidence — and the more devastating and
immediate the rise in the level of the sea.
Under natural conditions, deltas are in a
state of dynamic equilibrium, forming and
breaking down in a continuous pattern of
accretion and subsidence. Over time, these
sediments accumulate to form marshes and
swamps. But regional and local tectonic effects,
along with compaction, cause the land to subside
by as much as four inches a year if additional
sediments are not laid down.
Channeling, diverting, or damming rivers
can greatly reduce the amount of sediment that
reaches a delta. Where humans interfere with
river systems, sediment either shoots past
lowlands and is borne out to sea, as with the
38
Mississippi River, or it is blocked upriver, as with
the Nile and the Aswan Dam. When this
happens, sediment accumulation does not offset
subsidence. The result is more severe shoreline
erosion and a relative increase in seawater levels.
Subsidence also occurs where subterranean
stores of water or oil are drained. In Bangkok,
Thailand, net subsidence has reached five inches
per year from a drop in the water table caused by
excessive withdrawals of groundwater over the
last three decades.
In Louisiana, reduced sedimentation along
with extensive tapping of groundwater and
underground stores of oil and gas have
accelerated the disintegration of the Mississippi
delta. That state now loses more land to
subsidence and sea-level rise on an annual
basis — 50 square miles per year — than any other
state or country in the world.
According to WHOI's Milliman, the
combined effects of sea-level rise and subsidence
in Bangladesh and Egypt, whose populations are
concentrated on deltas, threaten the homes and
livelihoods of some 46 million people.
To arrive at that figure, Milliman's research
team started with two estimates of sea-level rise:
a minimum of 5 inches by 2050 and 11 inches by
2100, and a maximum of 31 inches by 2050 and 85
inches by 2100. They then calculated the effects
under three scenarios.
Under the "best case" scenario, the
researchers assume the minimum rise in sea level
and a delta region in equilibrium. The second
scenario, called the "worst case," assumes the
maximum rate of sea-level rise and the complete
damming or diversion of the river system
draining into the delta. As mentioned, the
resulting subsidence must then be added to the
absolute rise in sea level. The third scenario is
referred to as the "really worst case." It assumes
that excessive groundwater pumping for
irrigation and other uses accelerates subsidence.
To calculate the economic implications of
these three cases on both Egypt and Bangladesh,
Milliman and his colleagues assumed present-day
conditions, such as the estimated share of total
population now living in areas that would be
inundated and the share of economic activity that
is derived from them. Continued settlement and
population growth in these areas will only make
for more environmental refugees.
Seven Feet from Disaster
Milliman's calculations bode poorly for
Bangladesh, the country built on the world's
largest deltaic plain. The Bengal Delta occupies
about 80 percent of Bangladesh's total area.
Much of the remainder is water. As a result, the
nation's inhabitants are subject to annual floods
from the rivers and from ocean storm surges.
Just how severely sea-level rise will affect
Bangladesh depends in part on the pace at which
damming and channeling proceeds on the three
giant rivers and their tributaries. Although annual
flooding is severe and can damage crops grown on
the flood plains, large areas of the delta region
suffer drought for the rest of the year. The
diversion of river water to parched fields leaves
Bangladesh in its present predicament: sedimenta-
tion is decreasing and subsidence is increasing.
The WHOI researchers have also
concluded that the increasing withdrawal of
groundwater in Bangladesh is exacerbating
subsidence. Between 1978 and 1985, there was at
least a sixfold increase in the number of wells
Current Sea Level
50 centimeter
Sea Level Rise
20-2.5 meter
Sea Level Rise
How the low-lying Asian nation of Bangladesh would
be affected by various amounts of sea-level rise.
(Courtesy of United Nations Environment Program)
drilled in the country. Sediment samples suggest
that the withdrawal of well water may have
doubled the natural rate of subsidence.
Taking these factors into account, Milliman
and his colleagues estimate Bangladesh is going
to experience the "really worst case" scenario.
The effect of sea-level rise will be as much as 82
inches along the coast by 2050, in which event
it's likely 18 percent of the habitable land will be
under water. More than 17 million people would
become environmental refugees. The 57-inch rise
in the worst case wouldn't spare the nation: 16
percent of its land would be lost.
By the year 2100, the really worst case
scenario would have progressed to the point that
38 million Bangladeshis will be forced to relocate.
(continued on page 42)
39
Sea Levels: Past, Present, and Future
by John D. Mi Hi man
I he popular accounts about rising sea levels
often make it seem as if the ocean is guilty
of a subversive activity. In truth, global sea
level has never remained constant. It changes
as ice shelves (say, on Antarctica) and
glaciers freeze or melt, air temperatures warm
or cool (thereby causing thermal expansion
or contraction of the oceanic water masses),
and ocean ridges change their rates of
expansion.
To complicate the picture even more,
local sea level depends not only on
fluctuations in the sea, but also on the
geological stability of the land itself; a site
uplifted at the same rate as global sea-level
rise would, for instance, experience no
relative rise in sea level.
Over geological time, changes in
global sea level have occurred in two ways,
each having distinct magnitudes and
durations. As the sea floor spreads from the
midocean ridges, igneous rock, or lava, is
piled on older ocean crust. With time, the
crust settles under the increased rock load. If
spreading rates decrease, the subsidence can
exceed the production of new volcanic rock,
and the surrounding basin will deepen,
increasing its volume. If, on the other hand,
the spreading rate increases, the production
of new volcanic rock can exceed subsidence
and the volume of the basin will decrease.
As the basin increases or decreases its
holding capacity, water levels will fall or rise.
Although the times involved in ocean-ridge
spreading (and therefore basin volume) are
geologically slow— many millions of years -
the actual vertical change in sea level can be
impressive, often hundreds of meters.
Evidence of tectonically lowered sea level can
be seen most easily in seismic profiles across
continental margins, as well as by geological
samples of older strata. These show the signs
of ancient sea floors many hundreds of feet
beneath the modern sea floor.
Superimposed on these long-term
changes in sea level are glacially induced
Sea Levels
Past and Projected
for
Portland, Maine
Thousands of Years Ago
20 15 10 5
50 r
oJ40
0)
0)
0>
_l
(0
0)
CO
0)
*«•
JD
0>
QC
Feet
Below _
Present
Level
100N
200
300
400
20
10
0
J_
I
I
_L
I
I
I
I
1920 1940 1960
1980 2000 2020
YEARS
j
2040 2060 2080 2100
-I 500
Over the last 15,000 years, sea level off the northeastern United States has risen by more than 300 feet, reaching the
present-day level about 1,000 years ago (lower left). Within the last 60 years, mean annual sea level has fluctuated
somewhat, but generally risen by about four inches, as indicated by the mean annual average at Portland, Maine
(determined by David G. Aubrey and Kenneth O. Emery). The far right part of this figure shows both the projected
rise in sea level by the year 2100, if the rate of rise remains similar to that of the last 60 years (lower line). But
various models proposed by the National Academy of Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency predict a
greater rise of sea level, varying between a foot and seven feet by the year 2100. The right-hand illustration has been
expanded vertically to show more clearly the oscillations in annual sea level at Portland.
40
fluctuations. The water supplied to glacier ice
ultimately comes from seawater evaporation.
Thus, during glacial periods sea level falls by
150 to 450 feet, while oceanic salinities can
increase by as much as several percent. In
contrast to changing rates of crustal genesis,
the glacial cycle is relatively fast, each
complete cycle lasting only about 100,000
years. The last glacial cycle, the so-called
Wisconsin Glaciation, ended only about
15,000 to 20,000 years ago, after which sea
level began to rise as the ice sheets melted.
From 15,000 to about 7,000 years ago, sea
level off New England rose more then 300
feet — rising nearly an inch a year at times -
and advancing horizontally by as much as 30
to 60 feet a year.
The method of determining the timing
and extent of the last low stand of sea level
is inexact at best. Basically, we date intertidal
or terrestrial fossils found as much as 300 feet
below present-day sea level. For instance, the
occurrence of mastodon teeth on the
continental shelf off the coast of the
northeastern United States clearly indicates
that this area was above water at some point
in the past. Similarly, old oyster shells would
indicate intertidal conditions. By knowing the
approximate nature of their habit, the present
water depth in which they are found, and
their age (usually determined by carbon- 1 4
dating), we can estimate the time at which
that area was at or near sea level. Inexacti-
tude comes from carbon contamination on
the one hand and accidental shifting of the
fossil on the other. At present, we have
about 100 data points for the eastern United
States, but even these are not enough to
construct a sea-level curve in which we can
have great confidence.
Recent studies show that the maxi-
mum drop of sea level off the southeastern
United States during the last glaciation was
perhaps no more than 200 feet, about half
that off New England. At least part of this
large difference between the two areas of the
eastern seaboard can be explained by actual
shape of the ocean surface. Geodetic
measurements made from satellites show that
ocean-surface topography at present varies by
100 to 200 feet. So there presumably was sea
level "doming" off the Southeast, and a
deepening off New England. Changes in the
mass loading of the polar regions by glacial
ice (for example, the northern latitudes
during the last glaciation) presumably can
affect the Earth 's wobble, and thereby ocean-
surface topography.
Over the last 5,000 years, the average
world climate has varied only slightly, and
sea-surface fluctuations have been corre-
spondingly small, probably no more than
three feet in terms of a global average. In
fact, a close look at sea-level changes as
evidenced by both archaeological ruins and
tide gauges indicate that most dramatic
changes in sea level have occurred in those
locales exposed to substantial uplift or
subsidence, rather than an actual rise of the
sea. In the Mediterranean, for example, N.
Flemming of the Institution of Ocean
Sciences in Wormley, England, has noted the
remains of old Roman ports on the coast of
Israel, and submerged Roman ruins off parts
of North Africa and Europe. Since sea level
cannot have fallen in one part of the
Mediterranean and risen in another, it's clear
that what we see is relative land motion.
The most common way to measure
modern changes (say, over the last 100 years)
in sea level is with tide gauges, using the
annual mean at a station. This number
averages out most seasonal variations in
freshwater discharge (where gauges are on or
near rivers), atmospheric pressure, winds,
and tides. But because mean river discharge
and winds var\/ annually, the change in mean
tidal elevation in successive years does not
necessarily indicate an actual change in sea
level. Instead, one must use many years of
readings to detect a meaningful trend.
David G. Aubrey and Kenneth O.
Emery at the Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institution find that at least 20 years of
continuous records are necessary for most
tide gauges, and a 30- to 40-year period is
preferred. Using statistical analyses of the
data points, Emery and Aubrey have been
able to calculate relative trends in sea-level
change over much of the world.
Long-term gauges indicate that global
sea level has risen about four to six inches in
the last 100 years. Although the year-to-year
resolution is admittedly poor, there appears
to be no scientific evidence to indicate that
sea-level rise has accelerated as the
concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide
has increased. On the other hand, because
of the local fluctuations in river discharge
and winds, it probably would take 5 to 10
years of annual means at any tidal station to
detect a meaningful rise or fall in sea level.
At present, sea level is rising by about
0.04 to 0.06 inches a year. If this rate were to
continue for another 100 years, it would
increase sea level by half a foot. While this
change may be significant for residents of
very low-lying areas, it hardly lives up to the
scary headlines weVe seen in the last few
years. How, in fact, do scientists forecast a
three- to six-foot rise in sea levels by the year
2100? More important, are these forecasts
realistic?
By trying to quantify the factors that
control glacially induced changes in sea
(continued on next page)
41
(continued from previous page)
level, scientists have created many predictive
models; indeed the number of models seems
to be rising at far greater rates than sea level
itself (article, pp. 16-21). The assumptions
used underlie the major disagreements
between the different models. For example,
the coefficient of thermal expansion of
seawater is well known, but how quickly
would ocean volume respond to a one
degree rise in atmospheric temperature?
Clearly, this depends on how quickly the
surface layers warm and the degree of
warming felt by the deeper water masses.
Similarly, given a one-degree (or two- or
three-degree) rise in air temperature, how
quickly would alpine glaciers ice melt, and,
more important, what would be the response
of the Antarctic ice shelf (the single largest
ice body within the ocean) to such warming?
The literature abounds with best- and worst-
case scenarios (article, pp. 36-39), but the
simple fact is that there seems to be no more
basis for saying that world sea level will rise
by three feet by the year 2100 than to say it
will rise by a foot. The variables in each of
the predictive models are simply too
unknown, although many scientists are
working hard to quantify their models.
Clearly, the scientific community
needs to choose several coastal areas that
appear to be relatively stable (based on the
worldwide tide gauge analysis by Aubrey and
Emery), and monitor the relative rise of sea
level at these locations with a rapid turn-
around of the data. Use of satellite-based
geodesy, some types of which have absolute
accuracies of 0.4 inch or less at present,
would be an important step, because it could
detect a dramatic change in sea level almost
immediately, whereas the more time-proven
tide gauge measurements might take as
much as 5 to 10 years to average
environmental factors.
For the near term, all but those people
living in low-lying coastal areas probably have
little fear of being inundated by the rising
sea. But in the longer term, say beyond the
next 10 to 15 years, it's still anyone's guess.
John D. Milliman is a Senior Scientist in the
Department of Geology and Geophysics at the
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
(continued from page 39)
The social and economic effects will be jarring.
Because nearly a third of the country's gross
national product is generated within the land
area that will be lost, an already poor country will
have to accommodate its people on a far smaller
economic base. Coastal mangrove forests, upon
which 30 percent of the country's population
depends to some extent for its livelihood, will be
the first victims of advancing seas and extensive
river diversion.
Where will the people displaced by rising
seas go? Moving further inland, millions of
refugees will have to compete with the local
populace for scarce food, water, and land,
perhaps spurring regional clashes. Moreover,
existing tensions between Bangladesh and its
large neighbor to the west, India, are likely to
heighten as the trickle of environmental refugees
from the former becomes a torrent.
Egypt's habitable area is even more
densely populated than that of Bangladesh. By
and large, Egypt is desert except for the thin
ribbon of productive land along the Nile River
and its delta. Egypt's millions crowd onto less
than four percent of the country's land, leading
to a population density there of 700 people per
square mile.
Milliman's study points out that because
the Nile has already been dammed — which
means most of the sediment that would offset
subsidence of the delta is trapped upstream -
only the "worst" and "really worst" cases are
relevant for Egypt. Consequently, local sea-level
rise would range between 16 and 22 inches by
2050, rendering up to 19 percent of Egypt's good
land uninhabitable.
If the increase is 22 inches, more than 8.5
million people would be forced to relinquish
their homes to the sea, and Egypt would lose 16
percent of its gross national product. By 2100,
local sea-level rise will range between 101 and
131 inches, submerging up to 26 percent of
habitable land and affecting an equal portion — 24
percent — of both population and domestic
economic output.
While neither Bangladesh nor Egypt is
likely to influence the global emission of
greenhouse gases or sea-level rise, they do wield
considerable control over local sea levels. The
development policies they choose in the near
future will have a significant effect on the future
of their deltas and the people who live on them.
Ecosystems at Risk
Coastal swamps and marshes are areas of
prodigious biological productivity. The ecological
and economic benefits derived from areas such
as Louisiana's wetlands are inestimable. Nearly
two-thirds of the migratory birds using the
Mississippi flyway make a pitstop in those
wetlands, while existing marshlands and barrier
islands buffer inland areas against devastating
hurricane surges. Marshes not only hold back the
intrusion of the Gulf of Mexico's salt water into
local rivers but are a major source of freshwater
for coastal communities, agriculture, and
industry. Louisiana's wetlands supply 25 percent
of the U.S. seafood catch and annually support a
42
$500 million recreational industry devoted to
fishing, hunting, and birding.
What was laid down over millions of years
by the slow deposit of silt washed off of land
from the Rockies to the Appalachians could be
jeopardized in a little over a century. Louisiana's
famous bayous and marshland may be overrun
by the year 2040, when the Gulf of Mexico will
surge up to 33 miles inland. With the delicate
coastal marsh ecology upset, fish and wildlife
harvests would decline precipitously and a ripple
effect would flatten the coastal economy.
Communities, water supplies, and infrastructure
will all be threatened.
According to Environmental Protection
Agency estimates, erosion, inundation, and salt-
water intrusion could reduce the area of coastal
wetlands in the United States by 30 to 80 percent
if today's projections of
sea-level rise are
realized. Vital wetlands
such as the Mississippi
delta and Chesapeake
Bay regions would be
irreparably damaged. No
one has yet calculated
the immense economic
and ecological costs of
such a loss for the
United States, much less
extrapolated it to the
global level.
Were it not for the
enormous pressure
human encroachment
puts on them, coastal
swamps and marshes
might have a chance to
handle rising seas by
reestablishing upland. But heavy development of
beach resorts and other coastal areas throughout
the United States means that few wetlands have
the leeway to "migrate."
Highly productive mangrove forests
throughout the world will also be lost to the
rising tide. Mangroves are the predominant type
of vegetation on the deltas along the Atlantic
coast of South America. On the north coast of
Brazil, active shoreline retreat is possible because
there is little human settlement; the mangroves
can possibly adapt. In the south, however, once-
extensive mangroves have been depleted or
hemmed in by urban growth, especially near Rio
de Janeiro. No more than 40 square miles of
mangroves remain where once thousands of
square miles stood. As sea level rises, these
remaining areas will disappear.
In 2100, cartographers will likely be
redrawing the coastlines of many countries. They
may also make an important deletion: by that
year, if current projections are borne out, the
Maldives, southwest of India, will have been
washed from the Earth. The small nation, made
up of a series of 1,190 islands in atolls, is
nowhere higher in elevation than six feet. A
mean sea-level rise of equal height would
For some areas, it could be the end of the road. (Cour-
tesy of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
submerge the entire country.
By 2050, the Florida Keys "will no longer
exist," according to Elton J. Gissendanner, past
executive director of the Florida Department of
Natural Resources. Loss of the Keys will displace
thousands of permanent residents and wipe out a
tourist industry that brings 100,000 people to the
area each year. Approximately 70 percent of
Florida's residents live right on the mainland
coast, but no study has been done to determine
how many will become environmental refugees.
Although increases in sea level will occur
gradually over the next several decades -
accelerating in 2030, when the greenhouse effect
is expected to really kick in — the issue has
already sparked a number of debates.
For one, should society continue on its
current path and accept sea-level rise as
inevitable, or should it
change consumption
patterns for fossil fuels
and chemicals to mitigate
a global warming? How
long should local and
national governments
wait before investing
heavily to defend their
shores against a future
threat, especially when
other needs are
pressing? When will it be
too late? Conversely,
should they seek to
protect these areas at all?
How can coastal
residential and resort
development be allowed
to continue if the land is
projected to disappear
within a few decades? And who should provide
insurance against catastrophe to those living in
high-risk areas? Perhaps most important, who will
help the Third World cope with the massive
dislocations?
The industrial nations, heavily reliant on
the burning of fossil fuels over the last century,
are primarily responsible for initiating global
warming. But today, virtually every citizen of
every nation engages in activities that make the
problem worse. Meanwhile, development
strategies currently being adopted by many
poorer countries — water projects that lead to
subsidence, policies that encourage defores-
tation, and development programs based on
fossil-fuel-intensive technologies -are likely to
exacerbate, the warming and its effects.
If current trends persist, global warming and
the subsequent rise in sea level will accelerate. If,
on the other hand, concerted action is taken
now — to raise energy efficiency and curtail overall
fossil fuel use, to find substitutes for
chlorofluorocarbons and other industrial chemicals
that aggravate the greenhouse effect, to stem the
tide of deforestation — then sea-level rise can be
kept to a minimum. D
43
The Impact on Water Supplies
by Harry E. Schwarz and Lee A. Dillard
What impact would the greenhouse effect
have on our drinking water? Urban water
supplies have, of course, always been subject
to the uncertainties of population growth (or
decline) and the variability of weather. But
the climate changes anticipated under a
general global warming would bring water
supply changes of a different order of
magnitude. How would they affect the ability
of water systems to deliver good, potable
water? Moreover, are urban water systems
preparing for the possible changes that
would accompany the higher sea levels and
new patterns of temperature and rainfall?
To answer these questions, we
interviewed senior managerial and technical
people representing nine urban water
systems. * Out of these extensive discussions,
If sea levels rise, storm sewers will back up.
(Courtesy of the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration)
we were able to draw certain general
conclusions.
Warming, especially longer and more
severe hot spells, would initially trigger
increased demand, especially in normally dry
regions. Such increases might also exacerbate
*The systems involved in our survey were: New
Orleans, New York City, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake
County, Washington D.C., Weber Basin Water
Conservancy District, Worcester (Massachusetts),
Indianapolis, and Tucson.
water quality problems, particularly with
trihalomethanes — a family of toxic (and
possibly carcinogenic) compounds formed
out of certain industrial waste products.
Higher temperatures would increase the rate
of reactions that produce these chemicals.
Increased average precipitation, greater
extremes of weather, and more frequent
storms would cause problems in storm
drainage. Greater runoff extremes would
affect flood protection and hasten the
deterioration of levees and floodwalls,
making presently protected areas vulnerable.
For coastal cities, the effect of sea-
level rise on system components would be
twofold. First, salt water moving upstream in
estuaries or bays would compromise quality.
Initial increases in salinity would cause
increased corrosion in pipes and pumping
facilities. At higher salinity, water from urban
systems with intakes in tidal rivers would not
be potable. Yield of upland sources could
also be affected, if water had to be released
from reservoirs in order to keep the salt front
below intakes. New Orleans is an example of
the former, New York City of the latter.
The higher sea level is itself a second
critical effect. Large areas, developed and
otherwise, could be inundated. Decisions to
abandon or protect these areas would have
to be taken. Greater pumping heads (that is,
higher pressure) on drainage and sewage
pumping stations, along with higher levees
and sea walls, would require expensive
solutions, often with long lead times.
Abandonment of existing facilities would be
politically difficult and expensive in terms of
lost productivity and investment. Less rainfall
and lowered groundwater, along with
flooding, could force salt water into coastal
aquifers, contaminating water supply.
Because many cities depend on
mountain water, any reduction of the annual
snow pack would significantly affect
supplies. Also, there is the matter of the
melt's timing. If early and rapid melting were
to produce runoff in excess of reservoir
capacities, the water would be wasted as an
uncontrolled flood.
Health effects of the projected scale of
climate change appear to be relatively
minimal given the present regulatory
environment. If standards for potable water
are maintained, health — as it relates to
water— would not be affected by climate
change, although costs would tend to rise.
For example, unless upgrades are made,
44
treatment in plants overloaded with more
turbid water could have some health effects.
Unless combined (sanitary and storm) sewers
are separated and/or effluent is treated,
contaminated overflows could also have
some adverse health effects. Further,
expensive additional treatment might be
required to maintain standards where longer
warm spells increased the formation of
trichloromethane, a toxic byproduct of
industrial wastes that forms during
chlorination.
In addition to estimates of system
sensitivity, our interviews with urban water
managers provided information about the
attitudes and perceptions of the managers
themselves. Perhaps due in part to scientific
disagreement, many of the officials we
interviewed aren't convinced that climate
change will occur, or even if it does, that it
will cause problems for urban water
management.
Only one system in our survey, New
York City, has studied the possible impact of
climate change. New Orleans and Tucson
indicated that planning studies would come
after recognition of the problem by the Corps
of Engineers and the Central Arizona Water
Conservation District, respectively. Washing-
ton D. C. officials said they would begin to
study the problem if there were "believable"
predictions of changes of at least 10 percent
in such things as temperature, rainfall and
runoff. Unfortunately, what they meant by
believable wasn 't defined.
Have any building decisions been
affected by the prospects of climate change?
We found only one example— again in New
York City. It involved raising a drainage outlet.
Still, the final choice was based not so much
on the likelihood of rising sea level as on the
comparatively low cost of the improvement.
Clearly, benefit/cost considerations will remain
integral to such decisions.
This is not to say that decision makers
will only respond incrementally; we believe
that where anticipation of climate change is
economical, there will be an appropriate
response. Instead, our survey points to the
difficulty that urban water managers have in
thinking about planning for climate change
in light of the immediacy of many other
problems vying for their attention and
dollars.
Our most significant finding is the lack
of acceptance of the likelihood and extent of
climate change among the managers and
planners we spoke to. Most professionals
questioned are taking a "wait-and-see"
attitude.
This go-slow approach is mitigated by
evidence from our survey that various
components of urban systems are resilient
enough to accept early manifestations of
climatic change without undue damages. Most
urban systems could cope — but at a price.
They might have to add to existing systems,
create entirely new ones, and perhaps
abandon parts of old ones. In areas affected by
a rising sea level, negative impacts would
Adding new ports (foreground) to the nearly
century-old gatehouse of New York City's Croton
Reservoir. (Photo by Marion Bernstein, New York
City Department of Environmental Protection)
compound and likely be severe. Water supply
systems in some locations would require major
changes with long lead times. Sanitary sewers
and waste water systems would be least
affected because they could be adjusted in
gradual stages.
Ironically, the oft-maligned
"overbuilding" and extreme "safety factors"
now used in water management may serve
some areas as a first round of protection
against climate change. Furthermore, many
measures that increase our ability to
withstand climatic variability will increase
resilience to climate change no matter how it
is manifest.
Harry E. Schwarz, a professor emeritus of
environment, technology, and society at Clark
University, Worcester, Massachusetts, is a civil
engineer and hydrologist who consults widely in
the United States and abroad. Lee A. Dillard is a
doctoral fellow in geography at Clark.
45
IDEAL MAP
of
NORTH AMERICA
during the
ICE AGE
T.C.Chamberlin
1894
46
The Historical View
Over the centuries, the debate about the whys and
wherefores of climate has raged hot and cold.
by Diana Morgan
Climate, along with the stars and the tides,
is one of the oldest subjects of human
speculation. What accounts for heat waves
and times of drought? How does climate
influence the evolution of societies and the
course of history?
In China, archaeologists have unearthed
some of the oldest evidence of man's anxiety
about climate: a set of oracle bones inscribed
with a weather report for the 10 days from 20 to
29 March, 1217 B.C., along with prayers for snow
and rain. Three thousand years later, climatolo-
gists have the technology to chart the outlines of
the world's changing climate over a timespan
going back millions of years. Even without the
aid of Chinese oracle bones, they can now
reconstruct a portrait of the weather in some
parts of the world around the year 1217 B.C. with
a reasonable degree of accuracy. Scholars have
recently managed to document the periodic
droughts, hot and cold spells, and other climatic
fluctuations that have afflicted, and sometimes
aided, human societies in various regions of the
Earth over the centuries.
Yet scientists and other researchers are still
far from understanding why climate changes and
far from agreeing on how (or whether) climate
has altered human history. They still cannot
reliably predict the weather 10 days from now, or
the climate 10 years from now. As Reid A. Bryson
of the University of Wisconsin, Madison,
observes, climatologists sum things up with the
quip: "Forecasting is very difficult, especially if it
deals with the future."
The Greeks may have been the first people
to recognize climate as something distinct from
weather, as a phenomenon that might change
over time and distance. More than 2,000 years
ago, Greek captains sailing north in the Black Sea
Opposite: This map by the American geologist T.C.
Chamberlin, circa 1890, was the first attempt to depict
the extent of ice in North America during the last ice
age. At right, an Andean glacier showing bands
representing a year's accumulation of ice. Such old ice
can be used to reconstruct past climates. (Photo by
Lonnie Thompson)
to trade wine and oil found the air turning
colder, just as the weather grew more inviting as
they sailed farther south from their homeland
toward Crete, Egypt, and Libya. Klima, a word
originally denoting latitude, came also to mean
the kind of weather specific to a locale.
The Greeks were also the authors of the
oldest surviving theories about the effects of
climate on human health and history. A fifth-
century B.C. medical treatise, "On Airs, Waters,
and Places," possibly authored by Hippocrates,
attributed what the Greeks viewed as the
47
"pusillanimity and cowardice" of the Asians to
"the nature of the seasons [in Asia], which do
not undergo any great changes either to heat or
cold, or the like; for there is neither excitement
of the understanding nor any strong change of
the body whereby the temper might be ruffled....
It is changes of all kinds that arouse the
understanding of mankind, and do not allow
them to get into a torpid condition."
Greek notions about climate and its effects
persisted for centuries. "In the North," wrote
Thomas Jefferson in 1785,
men are "cool; sober;
laborious; indepen-
dent.... In the South they
are fiery; voluptuary;
indolent; unsteady."
But no grand theory
of climate's effects
emerged until the
early 20th century, after
Darwin's concepts of
natural selection and
evolution had opened
the way to a questioning
of man's position in the
natural world. No longer
would man be universally
regarded in the Christian
world as a creature made
in God's image, only
modestly affected by his
surroundings on Earth.
Adherents of a new
school of climatology
marched in Darwin's
wake. To these deter-
minists, man was solely a
creature of his environ-
ment, especially climate.
The "grand old
man" of climatic
determinism was
Ellsworth Huntington, a
Yale geographer who
expounded his theories in a series of
semipopular books, such as The Pulse of Asia,
between 1907 and 1945. Huntington contended
that the productivity and mental ability of
individuals — and, ultimately, the rise and fall of
entire civilizations — were inseparable from the
impact of climate.
In some of the first scientific studies of
climate's physiological and psychological effects,
Huntington diligently measured the impact of
seasonal fluctuations of temperature and
humidity on human beings: the weight gains of
1,200 tubercular patients in New York between
1893 and 1902, the efficiency of 65 young women
in a North Carolina label-pasting factory, and the
mathematics grades of 240 West Point cadets
between 1909 and 1912.
Huntington's conclusion: A climate with an
average temperature of 64 degrees Fahrenheit
Yale's Ellsworth Huntington
determined national as well
(Courtesy of Anna Deming)
and relative humidity of 60 percent was most
conducive to health and to physical and mental
performance. Equally important were the stimula-
tion of daily and seasonal weather fluctuations
and, significantly, racial inheritance. (For
example, the "Teutonic race," he wrote, enjoyed
"an ineradicable" advantage in "mentality.")
Writing at a time of Anglo-Saxon hubris,
when the British Empire was at its apex and the
United States was a rising power, Huntington
maintained that no nation "has risen to the
highest grade of
civilization except in
regions where the
climatic stimulus is
great." The civilizations
of Rome, Persia, and
Egypt had declined, he
believed, because of
changing climates. He
singled out northwestern
Europe, the Pacific and
northern Atlantic coasts
of the United States, and
Japan (which had
recently won a startling
victory over the Tsar in
the Russo-Japanese war
of 1904-05) as regions
with the greatest natural
"climatic energy" of
modern times.
Huntington's ideas
gained a following in
academia, especially
among scientists. But in
the late 1920s, Arnold
Toynbee, a noted English
historian and admirer of
Huntington, developed a
new theory, arguing that
climate and culture
beheved climate throughout history had
as mdividual character. been fnvo|ved in a
dialectic of challenge and
response. "The stimulus
toward civilization," he
wrote, "grows stronger in proportion as the
environment grows more difficult," citing as one
example the flowering of Hellenistic Greece in
the arid heat of Attica.
Although Huntington's empirical data on
climate and individual behavior are still generally
respected by specialists, his conclusions were
soon rejected as racist, exaggerated, and overly
deterministic. (Toynbee fell out of favor for other
reasons.) Huntington's notions were also
undermined by the work of scholars in several
new specialties. By the 1930s, sociologists and
other practitioner j of the social sciences were
Diana Morgan is a Washington-based science writer
who was formerly an editor for Science 86. This article
originally appeared in the Winter 1988 edition of The
Wilson Quarterly (Vol. XII No. 5). Copyright e> 7988 by
Diana Morgan.
48
advancing a more sophisticated picture of the
evolution of human societies; they included such
influences as religion and migration. At roughly
the same time, the field of climatology was
moving away from speculation about climate's
influence into an era of technological inquiry and
precise historical measurement of climates past.
It is difficult for modern American city-
dwellers, cossetted by central heating in
winter and air conditioning in summer, and
virtually assured of supermarket groceries even
when drought-stricken crops are withering in
farmers' fields, to comprehend how important a
predictably stable climate was to the people of
earlier times. As late as the 15th century,
historian Fernand Braudel writes, the world
population "consisted of one vast peasantry
where between 80 and 95 percent of people lived
from the land and from nothing else. The
rhythm, quality, and deficiency of harvests
ordered all material life."
But prior to our own century, man's ability
to measure the vagaries of weather and climate
was limited — and slow to develop. The first
known attempts were in ancient Egypt, from
which archaeologists have unearthed fragments
of a large stone stele, carved by minions of the
pharaohs during the 25th century B.C., that was
used to record the levels of the annual Nile River
floods. The Egyptians counted on these annual
floods to irrigate the fields and nourish the
croplands with nutrients from upstream. The
Chinese, who began systematic observations
shortly after the Egyptians, were compulsive
record-keepers. They can probably claim
mankind's longest continuous documentation of
natural events. But, aside from crude rain
gauges, weather vanes, and other simple devices,
these early investigators possessed few reliable
measuring instruments.
The Greeks paid tribute to several gods of
the winds, including Zephyrus, who ruled the
western wind; medieval Catholics appealed to
Saint Medard for rain. The earliest climatologists
were probably priests; they studied the sky to
determine the time for sowing and reaping. In
ancient Sumer, they were responsible not only
for predicting the onset of the seasonal rains and
floods but also for inspecting the irrigation
canals, which channeled precious water to the
fields.
Man's sinfulness was believed to be at the
root of many calamities. In medieval Europe,
times of famine were often followed by purges of
heretics and unbelievers. In Germany, Catholic
priests exhorted their congregations to destroy
witches in the wake of hailstorms and other
meteorological scourges. But things began to
change by the 16th century. About 1590 Galileo
invented the thermometer; one of his followers,
Evangelista Torricelli, created the first barometer.
Comparative meteorology was born in 1654,
when the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand II
of the de' Medici family, ordered dozens of
identically calibrated thermometers from an
Italian glass blower and established the world's
first meteorological network across Italy.
After periods of unusually bad weather,
the anxious monarchs of France (in 1775) and
Prussia (in 1817), fearful of a permanent climatic
change, also established nationwide networks to
record daily temperatures, barometric pressure,
and rainfall.* For the first time, Europeans had
turned to scientists rather than priests or
folklorists to understand the forces of climate.
Toward the end of the 19th century,
scientists were able to report that, while average
temperatures did indeed fluctuate from year to
year, they could find no evidence of long-term
changes. Classicists, poring over the scattered
weather observations of the ancient Greeks,
concurred. Europe's climate, they believed, had
not changed for at least 2,000 years.
At the end of the Little Ice Age, European glaciers like
this one in the village of Argentierre in the French Alps,
were much more extensive. (Courtesy of the National
Center for Atmospheric Research)
Of course, there had been inklings that
the Earth's climate had once been dramatically
different. In Europe's glacier-studded Alps,
country folk who lived surrounded by ice-scarred
rockface and rubble at the foot of the mountains
took it for granted that the glaciers had once
advanced and then retreated. Until the mid-1 9th
century, however, most geologists rejected the
notion as fanciful.
The so-called erratic boulders in the Alpine
valleys, early 19th-century geologists said, still
*As researchers now know, the climate of 18th- and
early 19th-century Europe was in flux. But Prussia's King
Frederick William III acted after the extraordinary (and
disastrous) "year without summer" of 1816, when crops
in some parts of the Northern Hemisphere were killed
by frosts as late as mid-June. Many climatologists now
suspect that the violent eruption of Indonesia's Mount
Tambora in April 1815 was the likely cause. They
believe that ash and gases from the volcano, high in
the atmosphere, reduced the amount of sunlight
reaching the Northern Hemisphere.
49
adhering to Biblical chronologies of an Earth
born only 5,000 or 6,000 years ago, were probably
deposited by the Flood described in Genesis.
Bits of contrary evidence continued to
accumulate, however. By 1832, Reinhard
Bernhardi, a German professor of forestry,
dared suggest that an enormous ice sheet had
once blanketed northern Europe. A few years
later, the Swiss-born naturalist Louis Agassiz
began to popularize this view, writing
dramatically of a frozen Europe that heard only
"the whistling of northern winds and the
rumbling of the crevasses."
The Glacial Epoch, later research would
show, began almost three million years ago — in
Louis Agassiz popularized the view that Europe was
once covered with ice. (Courtesy of the Marine
Biological Laboratory Archives)
fact, we may still be living in it. At various times,
the Earth was as much as 36 degrees Fahrenheit
colder than it is today, and the oceans were
perhaps 500 feet below current levels. Ice sheets
up to two miles thick blanketed a third of the
Earth's land mass, extending as far south as the
Great Lakes and Cape Cod in North America,
covering Scandinavia and the British Isles in
Europe, and burying much of northern Asia.
These cold periods during the Glacial
Epoch were the ice ages. There have been
perhaps 10 of them during the last million years;
scientists still are not certain. (It was probably
during the last Ice Age, 15,000 to 35,000 years
ago, that humans first crossed what is now the
Bering Strait from Asia to North America.) The ice
ages were punctuated by warmer spells known as
"interglacials." It was not until about 8000 B.C.,
as the Earth began to warm during one such in-
terglacial, that Homo sapiens first took up farm-
ing, probably in ancient Mesopotamia and other
areas. The interglacials have been rare and
relatively short, lasting 9,000 to 12,000 years. "The
present 'interglacial,' " observes climatologist
Reid Bryson, "has been with us for about 10,800
years."*
During the 1860s, Scotland's James Croll, a
self-taught physicist who was employed as a
janitor at Glasgow's Andersonian College before
his theories won him international acclaim,
suggested that 100,000-year variations in the
Earth's orbit may have drastically reduced the
amount of sunlight reaching the planet during
the ice ages.
Others speculated that the solar system
had passed through one of the Milky Way's spiral
arms, becoming blanketed in dust dense enough
to filter out light from the sun. Other scientists
scrutinized the influence on climate of everything
from the tidal effect of neighboring planets and
the slow "drift" of the Earth's continents to the
spewed effluvia of volcanoes, the wandering of
the magnetic poles, and sunspots. Finally, during
the 1920s, a Serbian mathematician named
Milutin Milankovitch reworked Croll's theory of
variations in the Earth's orbit, showing with a
series of complicated equations how "stretch,"
"tilt," and "wobble" might have produced the
ice ages. Gradually, climatologists came to accept
(albeit with many qualifications) the general
outlines of Milankovitch's theory.
Meanwhile, geologists and climatologists
searched the glaciers and other sites for physical
clues to date the waxing and waning of the ice
ages — though the concept of nature as self-
chronicler was not new. In 1686, Robert Hooke, a
brilliant, irascible English philosopher who had a
famous feud over the nature of gravity with Sir
Isaac Newton, toying with fossilized shells that
resembled tropical species, wondered whether
Britain had once lain within a "torrid zone." It is
very difficult "to raise a chronology" by examin-
ing the shells, he observed, "and to state the
intervals of the times wherein such and such
catastrophes and mutations have happened; yet
'tis not impossible."
Before they could "raise a chronology,"
scientists needed field methods and technologies
that would allow them to quantify past climatic
change.
One such method was dendrochronology
— counting growth rings to determine the ages of
*During the 1970s, a cluster of especially cold winters
in the United States stirred widespread fears that a new
Ice Age was dawning. The National Academy of
Sciences warned that it could begin within 100 years;
analysts at the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency
prepared an assessment of American power in "a
cooler and therefore hungrier world."
50
trees. At the turn of the century, Andrew
Douglass of the University of Arizona likened the
annual rings to Morse code: The sequence of
dots (narrow rings indicating growth-limiting
conditions) and dashes (wider rings indicating
years of favorable conditions) relayed a message
about the climate during the tree's lifespan.
Douglass showed how the rings of a recently
felled tree could be matched with those of an
older stump or piece of fossilized wood, which
could then be linked to an even older sample,
ultimately allowing dendrochronologists to
stretch the record back 8,200 years, the edge of
the last ice age.*
The Earth's history is written in layers of
environmental debris. If each stratum of
ocean sediment, ancient soil, or Arctic ice
was layered more or less chronologically, scien-
tists reasoned, the perceptive investigator, by
sifting through layered clues, would be able to
discover the climate at the time each layer was
formed.
In 1916, Swedish botanist Lennart von Post
capitalized on this now-common notion when he
reported on his study of rich deposits of pollen
grains dug from lakes and bogs in his native
land. Soon, scientists throughout the West were
digging up soil samples, analyzing everything
from beetle genitalia and fossilized leaves to
microscopic creatures and chemical isotopes for
clues to climate changes in the past.
By examining a millimeter of soil under a
high-powered microscope, investigators such as
von Post could make a connection between the
relative amounts of pollens and prehistoric
climate, up to 100,000 years in the past. An
abundance of grass and shrub pollen suggests
the existence of frigid tundra and grasslands at
the edges of glaciers; birch and pine pollen hints
at a somewhat warmer climate; and the presence
of oaks and elms signals a temperate zone. In
China, the spread of bamboo is a reliable
indicator of regional warming in centuries past.
In the United States, the Dust Bowl
disaster in the Great Plains during the 1930s
(which was exacerbated by poor farming
methods) and several abnormally hot summers
jolted the public into a new awareness of
climate. Actually, the warming trend had begun
during the 1890s; it peaked during the 1940s,
when the Northern Hemisphere endured its
highest summer temperatures, and enjoyed its
mildest winters, in perhaps 1,000 years. (The
1980s have been warmer still, with several of the
hottest years on record; yet average annual
temperatures have been less than one degree
Fahrenheit above normal.)
In America and Europe, all of this
prompted the first wide discussion among
Tree rings are wonderfully specific, however, and
recent techniques allow scientists to calculate yearly
variations in temperature, rainfall, and even
atmospheric pressure at sea level.
scientists (if not in the press) of the "greenhouse
effect": Heat that formerly would have escaped
into outer space, the argument went, was being
trapped close to Earth by vast amounts of carbon
dioxide pumped into the atmosphere from
factory smokestacks and other manmade sources.
For the first time, it seemed possible that man
could inadvertently alter the global climate.
One of the most important new
technological developments was radiocarbon
dating, a technique developed in 1947 by Willard
Libby, a University of Chicago chemist, later a
Nobel laureate. It allowed scientists to determine
the age of fossilized plants and animals up to
40,000 years old. At about the same time, Harold
Urey, also an American Nobel laureate in
Some 3,000 years old, gnarled bristlecone pines in
California's White Mountains provide a window on past
climate. (Courtesy of the Laboratory of Tree-Ring
Research, University of Arizona)
chemistry, introduced another far-reaching
technique: isotope analysis of ocean sediments
and ice cores.* Suddenly scientists could peer
into the very distant past— up to 570 million years
ago — when ancient deep-sea creatures began
absorbing oxygen from the oceans to form
protective shells.
A 20-foot "core" -a cylinder of compacted
mud and ooze from the ocean floor — can provide
a sampling of sediments built up over millions of
years, allowing geologists, using Urey's method,
*On average, 99.8 percent of the oxygen in water is
ordinary oxygen, 1hO, but 0.2 percent is composed of
an isotopic form I8O, with two extra neutrons. In warm
weather, when ocean water evaporates quickly, the
relative amount of I8O increases as the lighter 16O is
drawn up into the clouds. Urey reasoned that past
ocean temperatures could be measured by determining
the ratio of the two isotopes in ancient sea fossils: the
more 18O in the fossil, the warmer the weather had
been. Urey's method did not allow scientists to date
samples; that had to be done by other means, chiefly
by counting the layers of sediment or ice.
51
to chart not only the progressive deep freezes of
the ice ages but also the temperature fluctuations
of the interglacial warm spells. In 1950, when
Drey shaved a sliver from the 150 million-year-old
fossil of a squidlike creature, he was able to
determine that the creature had been born in
early summer and died four years later in early
spring.
When the technique was later applied to
the comparatively spongelike material of the
Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, scientists
were able to trace the waxing and waning of the
interglacial periods with remarkable precision.
They were suddenly much closer to an under-
standing of past climatic change — and, possibly,
by extension, climate present and future.
Iust as scientists after World War II were
mapping broad climate variations across mil-
lions of years, a new breed of "docu-
..jentary" climatologist began the painstaking
task of reconstructing climate over a shorter
timespan.
A leader of the "documentary" school was
Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, an unconventional
French historian. Ladurie was determined to
develop a new historiography of the past 1,000
years, with special emphasis on Western Europe
during the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. His
chief method was to assess written records of
vineyard harvest dates in 18th-century France.
The principle behind this "phenological"
method, as Ladurie described it in 1971, was
simple. The date at which the grapes ripened
reflected the temperatures "to which the plant
[was] exposed between the formation of the
buds and the completion of fruiting.... These
dates are thus valuable climatic indicators."
Other "documentary" climatologists,
before and since, have dusted off epistolary
accounts of winter storms or counted the
number of prayers said for rain. They have
looked for clues to climatic change in the
accounts of Venetian diplomats, the ships' logs
of sea captains, and in reports on the frequency
of the canals freezing over in the Netherlands.
They have made two periods of relatively drastic
climatic change the focus of especially obsessive
examination.
The Medieval Warm Epoch (circa A.D. 1000
to A.D. 1400) brought the world the highest
temperatures in perhaps 5,000 years. During this
brief spell, the Vikings, unconfined by sea ice,
invaded Europe's Atlantic coast, traded with the
Italians and Arabs, colonized now inhospitable
Greenland, and possibly voyaged to North
America. Plagues of locusts descended on
Continental Europe. In Britain, farmers cultivated
flourishing vineyards and began working lands in
the north of Scotland, only to abandon them
forever a few centuries later.
The Earth began to cool again around A.D.
1200, gradually dropping about two to four
degrees Fahrenheit below today's levels, and the
period from 1400 to 1850 has been christened,
with considerable exaggeration, the Little Ice Age
(Oceanus Vol. 29, No. 4, pp. 38-39). Those four
centuries saw the modest advance of glaciers in
the Alps and elsewhere, the occasional winter-
time freezing of the Thames River, and periods of
widespread famine, as Europe's summers became
shorter, cooler, and wetter. Massive ice floes
hampered ocean travel in the northern Atlantic:
in 1492, Pope Alexander VI lamented that no
priest had visited Greenland for 80 years.
The Europeans of that era scribbled as
busily as do their chroniclers today: diaries,
monastic and manorial chronicles, and tax
reports have all become fodder for countless
late-20th-century doctoral theses packed with the
minutiae of a lost age. It is difficult to find a
season in Europe during the past 1,000 years for
which there is not an account of someone's
impression of the weather.
Until the last decade or so, however, the
"documentary" climatologists, for all their obses-
sion with detail, were regarded with indifference
by most "hard" scientists, who dismissed their
attempts to stitch together definitive analyses
from stacks of crumbling church records and
other sources. However, since the 1960s, when
Britain's Hubert H. Lamb, originally trained as a
meteorologist, came to the fore of documentary
climatology and began urging his colleagues to
employ greater rigor, the discipline has gradually
won more acceptance from scientists.
Recently, other scholars, such as historian
David Hackett Fischer of Brandeis
University, have criticized some of the
"documentary" climatologists (and most
mainstream historians) for giving short shrift to
the effects of climatic change on human affairs.
Ladurie came in for especially harsh criticism for
his view that "the human consequences of
climate seem to be slight, perhaps negligible."
Fischer, in sharp disagreement, proposed a
history of the "conjunctions" of climate and
culture. During the first conjunctive period, up
until about 10,000 years ago, he said, "variations
in climate determined the possibility for human
culture to exist at all." Later, climate influenced
the survival of complex civilizations. During the
third epoch, from about A.D. 1000 to the present,
man has been able to adjust, albeit painfully at
times, to changes in climate.
These modern historians, along with a few
climatologists and popular writers, have avoided
the determinism of Ellsworth Huntington; but
they have not shied away from large generali-
zations. Even Fischer, an exacting historian, has
pointed out that during the climatic upheaval of
the sixth and fifth centuries B.C., which seems to
have brought droughts to large parts of the
world, many of the "world's great ethical and
religious systems were created." He suggests that
the teachings of Confucius in China, Buddha in
India, Zoroaster in Iran, and the Jewish prophet
Deutero-lsaiah were all responses to the same
problem of creating stable values in a world of
52
This abandoned farm near
Pierce, Nebraska, in 7937
after its soil was ravaged by
wind erosion during the
Dust Bowl offers proof that
climate can change abruptly
and disastrously. (Courtesy
of the National Archives)
\
1
disquieting social and climatic change.
No less single-minded, other researchers
have debated the reasons for the disappearance
of the advanced Indus society in northwestern
India 5,000 years ago, pitting the impact of Indo-
European invasions against flooding in the Indus
Valley and, dubiously, to a long period of
drought. Analysts have variously tied the global
distribution of political stability to temperature,
and correlated the size of standing armies with
the degree of north or south latitude. In 1970, a
popular author, Robert Claiborne, went so far as
to suggest that a climate shift in A.D. 1200, which
led to the failure of the German herring fishing
fleets, paved the way for the rise of Adolf Hitler
seven centuries later.
And just as Ellsworth Huntington advanced
a theory of climate with an explicitly ideological
message earlier in the 20th century, so have
others in more recent times. For example,
Jayantanuja Bandyopadhyaya, an Indian political
scientist, argues, much as Huntington did, that
climatic handicaps account for the underdevelop-
ment of the Third World. Western scholars, he
claims, have suppressed the study of warm
weather's negative impact on man, emphasizing
racial superiority as the cause of the West's
economic preeminence. But Bandyopadhyaya
argues that the "neo-imperialist" West has a
moral obligation to level the climatic playing
field. His proposal: The United States and
Western Europe should invest in research on
"global climatic engineering" to find ways to
artificially cool down the tropics.
Eccentric as Bandyopadhyaya's position
may be, some climatologists warn that ideology
subtly influences all scholarly research on climate
and culture. "Even among the modern scientific
community," observe British researchers M. J.
Ingram, G. Farmer, and T. M. L. Wigley, "ideas
about climate are inevitably influenced to some
extent by current ideologies." They see the rising
worldwide alarm about threats to the environ-
ment since the 1970s as the chief impetus to the
growing debate over the relationship between
changing climate and man's culture.
Just as 16th-century Germans viewed
hailstorms as punishment by God for individual
sins, many scientists (and laymen) today see man
on the verge of self-destruction as a result of sins
against nature — the rapacious exploitation of
natural resources, pollution, the development of
harmful technologies. According to Ingram and
his colleagues, the personal views of climatolo-
gists "undeniably condition differing interpreta-
tions of the often ambiguous evidence."
Even without such sentiments, serious
scientists trying to penetrate the mysteries of
climate past and present confront a frustrating
task, for climate is the result of a vast array of
thousands of interacting variables. Climatologists
now often find themselves in the uncomfortable
position of knowing more about climate every
day, and, in some ways, seeming to understand
less.
Selected Readings
Lamb, H. H. 1977. Climate Present, Past and Future. Metheun,
New York.
Ladurie, E. L. 1971. Times of Feast, Times of Famine: A History
of Climate Since the Year 1000. Doubleday, Garden City,
New York.
Rabb, T. K. 1981. Climate and History: Studies in
Interdisciplinary History. Princeton, Princeton, New Jersey.
Wigley, M. L., M. J. Ingram, and G. Farmer, editors. 1985.
Climate and History: Studies in Past Climates and their
Impact on Man. Cambridge, New Rochelle, New York.
53
How Venus
Lost Its Oceans
by James F. Kasting
Venus today is an extremely
inhospitable place. Its closeness
to the Sun and its dense carbon
dioxide atmosphere combine to
produce a surface temperature of
some 460 degrees Celsius (800
degrees Fahrenheit) — far hotter
than your kitchen oven. It is also
exceedingly dry; the total water
on Venus is comparable to that
held in Earth's much thinner
atmosphere — 100,000 times less
than the water in the Earth's
oceans.
Was Venus always this dry?
I think not. A much more
plausible theory is that Venus
once had abundant water, but
lost it as the water vapor in its
upper atmosphere was broken
into its component atoms, oxygen
and hydrogen, and the lighter
hydrogen escaped to space.
Venus may also have once been
cool enough to form oceans.
Indeed, the early Venus may not
have been all that different from
the early Earth. (For an opposing
view, see following article, pp.
58-60.)
To appreciate why the
young planet may have been wet,
it helps first to understand the
opposing view: the equilibrium
condensation model for planetary
formation, which has been most
This view of an ocean/ess Venus was
created from data acquired by the
U.S. Pioneer orbiter and the Soviet
Venera spacecraft. (Courtesy of the
U.S. Geological Survey, Flagstaff,
Arizona)
54
vigorously defended by John Lewis and his
colleagues at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and the University of Arizona.
This model begins with a gaseous nebula
slowly condensing to form the Sun, planets, and
assorted debris. It prescribes a temperature
structure for the nebula:- hotter on the inside,
cooler farther out.
Most of the Earth's water was incorporated
into our planet as water-containing minerals,
such as tremolite or serpentine. We would
expect such minerals to form at the low
temperatures beyond the orbit of the proto-
Earth, but not in the warmer regions near the
orbit of proto-Venus. The nebula cooled slowly
and peacefully, according to the model, and
materials that condensed at a given distance from
the nebula's center would have a uniform
composition.
The equilibrium condensation model
successfully accounts for the shift from rocky to
icy materials as we move outward in the solar
system. But there are at least two good reasons
why its predictions might be misleading. It
presumes that the planets formed only from
materials that condensed in their immediate
vicinity and that there was little or no mixing of
distant planetesimals (small, solid bodies that
may have grown into planets as they collided and
accreted gravitationally). The question of how
much mixing actually occurred is unresolved.
Gravitational interactions among planetesimals
could have jumbled up materials formed in
different regions of the nebula.
The Role of Meteorites
Another way of thinking about this question is to
ask whether the terrestrial planets (Mercury,
Venus, Earth, and Mars) can be built from known
types of rocky fragments from the original
nebula. This, of course, presumes a certain
amount of nebular mixing so that different
materials can be incorporated into each planet.
Various researchers have suggested that the Earth
received its volatiles (substances easily
evaporated at low temperatures, such as water)
from carbonaceous chondrites, a type of organic-
rich meteorite. These meteorites are roughly 10
percent water by weight in the form of hydrated
minerals, along with large amounts of carbon
with hydrogen atoms attached. Oxidation of this
organic carbon by ferric oxides (minerals
containing iron and oxygen) would have released
carbon dioxide and water to the Earth.
Other researchers have suggested that the
Earth's volatiles were brought in by ordinary
chondrites -less highly oxidized meteorites with
much fewer volatiles than their carbonaceous
cousins. Oxidation of their carbon would have
yielded carbon dioxide but no water. Ordinary
chondrites do, however, contain some water
(about 0.2 percent by weight) in hydrated
materials. Thus, such materials must have been
completely absent from the neighborhood of
proto-Venus for the planet to have been born
dry.
The second problem with the equilibrium
condensation model is that it ignores comets -
surprising, in a way, because David Grinspoon
and Lewis have since invoked comets to explain
the excess amounts of the hydrogen isotope
deuterium in Venus' clouds (see box, pp. 58-60).
The comets that now make up the Oort Cloud,
which circles the Sun far beyond the orbits of the
nine known planets, are thought to have formed
originally in the vicinity of Uranus and Neptune.
Orbital perturbations from these giant planets
would have sent most of these comets away from
the Sun and out of the ecliptic (the plane defined
The Magellan spacecraft as it will look when it reaches
Venus in the summer of 1990 and begins orbiting the
planet. (Courtesy of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory)
by the Earth's orbit about the Sun). Many,
however, would have been scattered into the
inner solar system, where they could have
collided with the newly formed terrestrial
planets, including Venus. Indeed, the flow of
comets through the solar system during its first
several hundred million years may have been
1,000 to 10,000 times greater than it is today.
Christopher Chyba of Cornell University
has recently estimatea that the water in the
James Kasting, an associate professor in the Department
of Geosciences at Pennsylvania State University, was
formerly a research scientist at the NASA Ames
Research Center. This article was adapted from the
November/ December 1988 issue of The Planetary
Report published by the Planetary Society.
55
Earth's oceans could have been entirely derived
from comets even if they comprised only 10
percent of the impacts recorded on the moon.
(Since the Earth's constantly changing crust
eventually erases evidence of impacts, the
moon's mostly inert surface is a good record of
past bombardments.) Venus would presumably
have received a comparable amount.
Yet in about a hundred million years or
less, depending on the energy output of the
young Sun and the efficiency with which it
helped hydrogen to escape from the planet's
atmosphere, Venus would have lost its water. A
late veneer of cometary water would not have
been enough to form oceans. However,
compared to today, Venus' primitive atmosphere
would still have been very wet.
Another argument favoring an ocean-free
Venus is that it would have been impossible to
get rid of large amounts of water through
photodissociation (when light energy breaks
apart a chemical compound) and the escape of
hydrogen to space.
Blowing off Hydrogen
The specific mechanism for losing hydrogen
involves hydrodynamic outflow — a process
analogous to the way material is blown off from
the Sun as a stream of charged particles called
the solar wind. Theoretical studies have shown
that hydrodynamic escape would have efficiently
removed the hydrogen if the upper atmosphere
was rich in that element. But water vapor (and
thus hydrogen) could have been confined to the
lower atmosphere by a cold trap, an atmospheric
region where water vapor condenses to droplets
and falls back toward the surface.
Climatic models predict that an
atmospheric cold trap does not work well if the
lower atmosphere contains more than about 10
percent water vapor (by mass). A wet young
Venus would have had at least this much water
vapor in its atmosphere, so the cold trap would
have been forced up to very high altitudes. There
the pressure is so low that water vapor has little
urge to condense and fall back to the planet. It
would therefore have made its way into the
upper atmosphere, where it could have been
photodissociated. The hydrogen could then be
lost to space.
Lewis and his colleagues have not
challenged the idea that early Venus could have
lost lots of hydrogen in this way. Rather, they
point out what they perceive to be grave
difficulties in disposing of the oxygen left
behind.
Whether or not this oxygen poses a
problem for the wet young Venus model
depends in part on when the water was acquired.
If much of the water came in as the planet was
accreting, then its surface should have been
molten and the entire mantle (the planet's
interior region between its crust and core)
should have been turning over vigorously. A
virtually unlimited amount of oxygen could then
have entered the mantle. Water would probably
Despite its similarity to Earth, Venus is shrouded in a
dense layer of sulfur-laden clouds, which trap heat and
keep the planet's surface hotter than a kitchen oven.
(Courtesy of NASA/Ames Research Center)
have reacted with melted elemental iron and
released its hydrogen, forming our old friends,
the ferric oxides.
Once released, this hydrogen would have
made its way to the top of the atmosphere and
escaped if enough solar energy was available. If,
on the other hand, the inner solar system was
still filled with dust blocking the sunlight, then
the hydrogen would have remained in Venus'
atmosphere until the nebula cleared and it could
escape. In either case, lots of water could have
been lost without creating much free oxygen.
If Venus got its water from cometary
bombardment after it had accreted, that presents
a bigger problem. The amount of water that
could have been lost might then have been
something less than a full terrestrial ocean. If
fresh crustal material was produced at the same
rate as it is on Earth, it could have taken up
oxygen equal to about one-thirtieth of the Earth's
ocean (or an average depth of 100 meters).
Lewis and his coworkers have ignored
other possible oxygen sinks — processes and
places that could take up the element. For
example, Venus may have originally outgassed its
carbon dioxide (COO as carbon monoxide (CO).
One-tenth of a terrestrial ocean could have been
consumed in oxidizing CO to COj. Or oxygen
could have escaped to space if the solar energy
was strong enough. Indeed, from an energy
standpoint, Venus could have lost several
oceans, including the oxygen, during its first
hundred million years.
The real Achilles heel of the "runaway
greenhouse hypothesis," as the original wet
young Venus model was called, lies in getting rid
of the last part of the original water. Climatic
56
Under Venus' dense cloud cover, radar probes from
Earth and spacecraft have discovered continental-like
land masses that may once have been surrounded by
oceans. (Courtesy of NASA/Ames Research Center)
theory predicts that a cold trap would have
developed as the water vapor content of Venus'
lower atmosphere fell below a tenth of a percent.
If Venus already had its massive 90-bar carbon
dioxide atmosphere, then roughly 10 Earth
atmospheres of water would have remained in its
lower atmosphere when the cold trap began to
become effective. The rate of this water's escape
depends on the temperature and height of the
cold trap, and so is hard to estimate. But crude
calculations suggest that it would have been hard
to lose this much water even over several billion
years.
Furthermore, at some stage sulfuric acid
clouds like those enshrouding Venus today
would have started to form. These water-loving
clouds would have taken up the errant water and
dried out the upper atmosphere even more,
further reducing the rate of hydrogen escape.
Some Very Hot Seas
Why, then, does so little of Venus' original water
remain? If we start with an Earth-like planet
covered with an ocean and then calculate how
much solar heat is needed to vaporize the ocean,
climatic models (mine, at least) predict that the
Sun's energy today falling on Venus is more than
enough to do the job. However, shortly after it
formed, the Sun was about 30 percent dimmer
than it is now, so the energy falling on primitive
Venus could well have been cool enough for
liquid water to form. Thus, if Venus did start out
with an Earth-like water endowment, much of
that water should have condensed to form a hot
ocean. That ocean's temperature would have
depended on the effects of clouds and the
amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but
it was probably between 100 and 200 degrees
Celsius (212 and 392 degrees Fahrenheit). Since
the overlying vapor would have kept the water
from boiling, liquid water should have been
stable on early Venus even if the planet had only
a fraction of the Earth's water.
An ocean on early Venus should have
caused great changes in its atmosphere. On
Earth, water weathers silicate rocks, converting
them to carbonates and taking up atmospheric
carbon dioxide in the process. Similar weathering
reactions, which occur in the presence of liquid
water, would have reduced Venus' atmospheric
pressure by sequestering carbon dioxide in the
planet's crust. This reduction of atmospheric
carbon dioxide would have facilitated water's
escape because much less water would have
been present when the cold trap started to form.
The presence of liquid water would also
have helped solve the problem of the water-
trapping sulfuric acid clouds. All common sulfur
gases are soluble in water, so if an ocean was
present, they would have eventually dissolved to
form various sulfur-containing minerals. The
sulfuric acid clouds that today hide the planet's
surface could not have formed until the ocean
had disappeared and sulfur was recycled into the
atmosphere by volcanic activity. Carbon dioxide
could have been regenerated similarly. Over
billions of years, volcanic outgassing would have
produced the present atmosphere.
A reasonable history of water on Venus,
then, might go like this: Venus started off wet
because it could not avoid receiving some of the
same volatile-rich material that formed the Earth.
Once the initial accretion period was over, the
combination of a dimmer Sun and protecting
clouds would have given Venus a relatively cool
surface. If it had anything approaching the Earth's
water inventory, much of it would have
condensed to form oceans. Carbon dioxide
would have been slowly converted to carbonate
rocks, and the atmosphere would have thinned.
Water would have remained a major
component of the atmosphere, its abundance
gradually decreasing through photodissociation
and hydrogen escape. Some of the oxygen may
have been dragged off to space with the
hydrogen; the rest was consumed in oxidizing
carbon monoxide and in reacting with minerals
in the planet's crust. Because the atmosphere
was thinner then than it is today, most of Venus'
original water would have escaped by rapid,
hydrodynamic outflow. The rest was lost over
billions of years by slower, nonthermal escape
processes. The disappearance of water allowed
the carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide released by
volcanos to accumulate, and the atmosphere
gradually approached its present state.
57
The Venus Question Is Still Up in the Air
by David Grinspoon
In planetary science, "proof" is often hard
to come by since we are starved for data and
the problems are so grand. Yet I believe that
on the question of ancient oceans on Venus,
flimsy or circumstantial evidence has been
given more weight than is justified, and that,
whether we like it or not, the question still
rings truer than any answers we have found.
Restricted at present to our own solar
system, we must be content with data from
but a few distant laboratories, inventing
theories after the fact for ancient experiments
beyond our design. Could Cregor Mendel
have discovered the laws of genetics if he
had had only one pea plant to work with and
one hour to observe it, rather than gardens
and generations? The limitation of this small
array of planets increases the temptation to
regard Venus — with its strikingly similar size
and closeness to Earth — as a dry, lifeless
control for the terrestrial experiment. Thus a
persistent approach to the study of Venus
has been to assume that initial conditions
were essentially identical to those on the
primordial Earth and ask, in effect, "What
went wrong?"
The realization that Venus' pearly
brilliance in our morning and evening skies is
due to a permanent planet-wide cloud cover
supported scientists' expectations, wide-
spread in the 19th and early 20th centuries,
that the surface would be found to be a
tropical swamp resembling the carboniferous
Earth. However, the discovery in the late
1950s of an unusual source of microwave
radiation coming from Venus, found to be
the thermal glow of an extremely hot surface
(not quite red-hot, but almost) eventually
dispelled the notion of oceans on present-
day Venus. The very small amount of water-
measured above the clouds by Earth-based
spectroscopy, and in the lower atmosphere
by Soviet and American spacecraft— coupled
with the finding that the clouds are
composed of concentrated sulfuric acid,
confirmed that "Earth's twin" is a hellish
place.
When it was established that Venus
has 100,000 times less water than Earth, some
scientists tried to account for the "missing"
water. Several groups of researchers have
applied themselves to this problem, most
recently James Kasting and his colleagues.
They've built an internally consistent and
credible scenario, supported by detailed
modeling, of a once-Earthlike Venus that has
lost its oceans due to a "runaway
greenhouse" that boiled the oceans, sending
much of the water to the upper atmosphere
where sunlight tore hydrogen atoms from the
water molecules.
In this scenario Venus and Earth are
identical twins separated at birth, with only
environment to blame for their vastly
different fates. Venus grew up too close to
the Sun and went dry. Earth was brought up
farther out in the suburbs of the solar system
where it's possible for a decent planet to
maintain a stable ocean. But could nature as
well as nurture play a role in the unfolding of
these lives? Could Venus have been born
dry? If so, then the two planets may have
followed very different paths throughout
their histories.
Sorted into Zones
According to the equilibrium condensation
theory, first proposed by John Lewis in 1972,
the temperature gradient of the solar nebula
(the flattened disk of dust and gas out of
which the planets formed) sorted the
condensing materials by composition into
zones.
The compositions of the planets that
formed from these materials preserved this
trend, varying systematically with distance
from the Sun. Venus, orbiting farther in than
the Earth, would have had much less initial
water than our planet.
One crucial question is whether the
process of planet building was orderly
enough to maintain these chemical zones.
After solid grains condensed and began to
collide and grow into larger bodies, did these
planetesimals stay in nearly circular orbits,
like runners confined to specific lanes at a
track? This would preserve the planets'
chemical differences as they grew. Or did
gravitational interactions lead to wild
elliptical orbits, allowing planetesimals from
inside and outside lanes to mingle, smearing
out any initial compositional trends?
Proponents of a wet young Venus
argue that there should have been enough
mixing among the planetesimals to form the
terrestrial planets and provide them with
David Grinspoon is nearing completion of his doctorate
in planetary science at the University of Arizona. A
longer version of this article appeared in the
November/December issue of The Planetary Report.
58
nearly identical amounts of volatile materials,
including water. This argument has been
supported by recent models by dynamicist
George Wetherill, who suggests that elliptical
orbits and extensive mixing dominated the
growth of the terrestrial planets. Yet density
differences among the terrestrial planets
clearly show that they are not all made of the
same stuff, so mixing was not complete.
No one would expect Venus to be
born completely dry, but whether she was
endowed with 1, 10, or TOO percent of a
terrestrial ocean is a question related to the
process by which the planets assembled
themselves. Until we better understand
planet formation, we should not assume that
Venus was originally endowed with an Earth's
worth of water.
Breaking Even
If, on the other hand, the Earth's oceans come
from an early, massive comet bombardment,
then Venus would have received a compar-
able amount of water regardless of how the
planets accumulated. Thus, early oceans on
Venus are not incompatible with an
equilibrium condensation model of planet
formation.
Recently, John Lewis and I have been
studying the question of water on Venus
without assuming that Venus was once wet.
We've concluded that, contrary to prevailing
opinion, Venus is probably not losing water,
but breaking even in the long run. If you let
the hydrogen contained in all the water now
on Venus escape at its current rate (about 20
million hydrogen atoms per square
centimeter every second), you would run out
of water in a fairly short time — 87 million to
870 million years depending on whose
number you believe for water abundance.
Even the high end of this range for water's
lifetime is considerably shorter than Venus'
age. This suggests to us that rather than
simply being in decline, water on Venus is in
a steady state, meaning that there is a
continuous source of water to balance the
sink of nonthermal escape.
What might this source be? One
possibility is volcanic outgassing. The gas
that hisses and burps from volcanos on Earth
is mostly water vapor. Some researchers
believe that volcanic activity is occurring on
Venus today, but the amount of outgassing,
if any, is totally unknown.
We also know that comets and water-
rich asteroids occasionally hit Venus, adding
water to the planet's atmosphere. When
fhese objects strike Venus they should
vaporize and add their water to the planet's
inventory.
Using information from the number of
craters on the moon, telescopic observations
of comets, and orbital calculations, we can
place reasonable bounds on the infalling
water. Interestingly, the rate of water escape
from Venus falls right in the middle of the
infall range. We are not talking about the
hypothetical massive early comet
bombardment that may have contributed to
the Earth's oceans. We are saying that a
constant infall consistent with the observed
number of comets in the solar system today
can explain the water now on Venus.
What a bizarre life these hydrogen
atoms lead! Sequestered in cold storage for
If Venus was born dry, Botticelli's famous painting
of her emergence from the sea may have been all
wet. (Painting by Michael Carroll, Courtesy of The
Planetary Society)
billions of years in cometary ice, liberated in
a violent impact on Venus with an energy of
hundreds of millions of megatons, drifting
for millions of years in Venus' torrid
atmosphere in a variety of chemical
combinations, diffusing into the upper
atmosphere (perhaps doing some time in the
sulfuric acid clouds on the way up), only to
be flung back out into interplanetary space.
Large comet impacts should also
produce dramatic fluctuations in water
abundance, which could, in turn, cause
strange climatic episodes and affect the
surface and atmosphere. Comets strike the
(continued on next page)
59
(continued from previous page)
Earth but don't noticeably affect the water
abundance because our planet is so wet.
(Who notices a drizzle when swimming?)
They may, however, occasionally cause mass
biological extinctions here, such as the
disappearance of the dinosaurs 65 million
years ago.
This steady-state model, in which a
cometary source (perhaps with some
outgassing thrown in) balances hydrogen
escape to space, seems to do a good job of
describing Venus today. But was it always
like this? Is there a shred of hard evidence
that oceans once existed? Some researchers
would say that yes, there is a shred: the
deuterium-to-hydrogen ratio.
Deuterium is heavy hydrogen.
Ordinary hydrogen is the simplest atom
conceivable: one proton and one electron.
However, the Big Bang blessed some
hydrogen atoms with an extra neutron, and
these atoms are what we call deuterium.
Since their electronic structures are identical,
these two isotopes behave almost identically
in chemical reactions, where electrons rule.
But since deuterium is twice as heavy as
hydrogen, any mass-dependent process,
including the most important nonthermal
escape process on Venus, discriminates
between them.
In 1982, the American spacecraft,
Pioneer Venus, measured the deuterium-to-
hydrogen (D/H) ratio of Venus' atmosphere.
The value was quite high, about WO times
higher than the deuterium-to-hydrogen ratio
on Earth (160 deuterium atoms for every
million hydrogen atoms.) At the time, this
observation was seen as the "smoking gun"
revealing direct evidence of Venus' wet past.
The reasoning went as follows:
Hydrogen is half as heavy and is thus
much easier to accelerate to escape velocity.
So as the hydrogen from Venus' vanishing
water supply has escaped over the eons, it
has left behind a residue of deuterium,
resulting in an ever-increasing D/H ratio.
Since Venus probably started with the same
ratio as Earth, its modern value of WO times
Earth's ratio implies an initial water abun-
dance at least WO times greater than the
water left there today, perhaps much greater
since some deuterium escapes along with the
hydrogen.
No Definitive Conclusions
This interpretation of the D/H ratio has two
flaws. First, it involves an assumption about
the original D/H on Venus. There is a wide
range of D/H values throughout the solar
system, and the origin of the Earth 's value is
not well understood. So the assumption that
the initial D/H on Venus was identical to the
current terrestrial value, while a reasonable
possibility, should not be used to draw
definitive conclusions about the history of
water on the planet.
The other problem is that it assumes
that the water abundance has simply been
declining over Venus ' lifetime. It does not
allow for the possibility of hydrogen sources.
Yet the short lifetime of water against
nonthermal escape strongly suggests, if it
does not demand, a hydrogen source. How
does this steady-state model affect the
interpretation of the D/H ratio? If you bring in
enough water and let a lot of hydrogen but
very little deuterium escape, then over the
ages the D/H will increase, with no change in
the total hydrogen abundance.
New mathematical solutions allowing
for hydrogen sources show that billions of
years of steady-state evolution can lead to a
hundredfold increase in the D/H ratio. Thus,
the observed D/H ratio does not necessarily
imply a past excess of water. Unfortunately,
the time required to build up a respectable
deuterium excess in this way depends on the
average water abundance over time, which is
poorly known for Venus.
Given these uncertainties, it is hard to
tell whether or not the observed D/H really
requires an early Venus with WO times the
water it now holds. But either way, WO times
almost nothing is still not very much: A body
of water WO times the present amount on
Venus is equal to a layer only a few meters
thick over the entire planet. Is this an ocean?
Perhaps a small one. But there is really no
evidence for the earlier massive
hydrodynamic escape that is supposed to
have removed most of the ocean.
The question of whether or not there
were ancient oceans on Venus is intimately
related to some "big picture" questions:
How did the planets form? Where did Earth's
water come from? Was the origin of life on
Earth an inevitable consequence of cosmic
evolution or freak accident? Were there
unique conditions that led to this event?
In our lust for the answers, let's resist
jumping on bandwagons that may or may not
be heading in the right direction. Perhaps the
Magellan radar mapper will reveal the telltale
signs of ancient shorelines. Wouldn't that be
wonderful? Or perhaps future chemical
investigations will demonstrate the presence
or absence of all the oxygen that would be
left behind in the rocks by an escaping
ocean. But for now, while we brandish our
opinions and push our theories to the limit,
let's also admit, without shame, all the
gaping holes in our knowledge of solar
system history that make this young science
such a challenge and a joy to pursue.
60
Climatic Catastrophe:
On the Horizon or Not?
by Andrew R. Solow and James M. Broadus
What's the appropriate response to the
possibility of global climate change? The answer
depends on many factors, including the timing,
nature, and magnitude of the predicted change,
as well as the benefits and costs of the response
itself. Certainly, any response designed to cope
with a rapid change of large magnitude could be
a costly mistake if the world's climate changed
much more slowly and modestly.
Our dilemma is compounded by our
ignorance. For all the concern over an impending
climate catastrophe, the fact remains that a great
cloud of uncertainty hangs over all predictions
about future climate, to say nothing of such
related issues as the depletion of the ozone layer
and acid rain.
Most of our information about the
possibility of climate change comes from
experiments with large-scale numerical climate
models run on computers (article, pp. 16-21).
And therein lies much of the problem. All too
often the results of these experiments are treated
as if they represent a picture of future climate as
accurate as the forecast for tomorrow's weather.
In our view, such interpretations are an example
of gullibility, if not worse.
Are we being unnecessarily harsh? We
don't think so. Remember these long-term
forecasts depend on models that are themselves
severely limited. They attempt to represent
mathematically complex physical processes
shaping the Earth's climate that are only
incompletely understood. Among them: the solar
cycle and the Earth's orbital movements; the
circulation of the atmosphere along with its
composition and radiative properties; the
chemical, physical, and thermodynamical
properties of the oceans; precipitation,
streamflow, soil moisture content, evaporation,
and cloudiness; the spatial distribution of ice,
snow cover, and other factors influencing the
reflective properties of the Earth; and the
behavior of forests, plankton, and other
biological populations.
Operating at varying scales of time and
space, these processes are extremely complicated
even functioning by themselves. When they act
together, or are coupled, the complications
multiply greatly. To say that we have only an
imperfect understanding of their interactions,
and the ways in which they influence and are
influenced by climate, is probably an understate-
ment. So, any climate models built on this
limited knowledge must be considered far from
perfect as well.
We are limited also by the inadequacies of
the computers on which the models depend.
Even the fastest and largest computers are still
unequal to the "number-crunching" needed to
couple the oceans and the atmospriere, and to
represent important, intricate climate processes
like the behavior of clouds and ocean eddies.
But let's grant for a moment the ability of a
model to forecast climate accurately. One would
surely expect that it could prove its skills by
replicating past climate — in effect, by making a
retroactive prediction. Since we're interested in
what climate holds in store for us several
decades hence, we might logically ask, how well
does the model "forecast" climate for the last
few decades?
The answer usually is: not very well. Most
climate models put through such an exercise
"predict" a global warming of at least one degree
Celsius (1 .8 degrees Fahrenheit) over the last
century from the much-discussed "greenhouse
effect." In fact, while there has apparently been
some warming during this period, it has been no
more than half a degree Celsius — and possibly
much less. The difference may not seem very
large, but it is an error of a factor of at least two.
As it happens, there is no clear evidence
of a human-induced greenhouse warming. That
means that the models err not only in predicting
a past greenhouse warming that failed to occur,
but also in not predicting past warming that did
occur because of other causes. Yet even if the
models had faithfully reproduced past climate,
that wouldn't necessarily guarantee the accuracy
of their forecasts for the future. This is
particularly true if the climate model is "tuned,"
Andrew R. Solow is a Social Scientist at the Marine
Policy Center of the Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institution, specializing in economic statistics. James M.
Broadus, an economist, is Director of the center.
61
directly or indirectly, by forcing it to reproduce
known past climate.
That hasn't been the case, however. The
models disagree substantially about future
climate. They predict a global warming stemming
from a doubling of the level of atmospheric
carbon dioxide (the timing of which is also
uncertain) ranging from one-and-a-half degrees
to five degrees. Clearly, the consequences of a
rise of one-and-a-half degrees would be much
different than those of five degrees. The spread
is even greater for forecasts of regional climate.
Climate models, to be sure, were never
intended to be used to generate forecasts for
many decades into the future. They were created
as tools for learning more about climate
processes. So in a strict sense, any scenarios
generated by them are not really forecasts at all-
and to treat them as such contradicts their
original purpose.
Little Disagreement from Climatologists
As skeptical as these comments may sound, there
is in fact little disagreement within the
climatological community over their substance,
only perhaps over their emphasis. Many climate
modelers would choose to stress the success of
climate models at reproducing certain aspects of
recent climate and the extent to which model
forecasts agree. But it isn't minimizing the
successes of climate modelers, or their expertise
and dedication, to point out that except perhaps
in the crudest sense, we're still very far from that
elusive goal: the creation of climate models
capable of forecasting climate decades into the
future with the kind of precision needed to guide
policy formulation.
The availability of reasonably accurate
temperature data for a large number of locations
goes back a century or so. From these readings,
series of mean global temperatures have been
constructed. Generally, they show an intermittent
warming of about half a degree from the
beginning of the record in 1880 (Figure 1). During
some periods, the warming has been relatively
rapid. The 1980s were one such period; so were
the 1890s and the 1920s. Other periods -the
1940s and 1950s, for example — have been marked
by a cooling.
These data are not without problems,
however. The readings are limited in their
coverage of many areas, and over the years there
were changes in how the measurements were
made. Especially significant, many of the records
contain a highly localized warming component,
the so-called urban heat-island effect, which
results from population growth and the buildup
of heat-retaining structures like buildings and
roadways. Apparently present in communities
with a population as small as only a few thousand
people, it may account for as much as a third of
the apparent warming since 1880.
Perhaps the most careful regional study of
long-term temperature data was that performed
by Kirby Hanson, George Maul, and Thomas Karl
for the United States. It showed that there has
been no net warming in the lower 48 states over
the last 100 years. Since the United States covers
only a small fraction of the Earth's surface, we
can't draw too general a conclusion from these
results. Still, it's remarkable that in the only
relatively large land area for which enough
reliable data exists, there is no unequivocal
evidence of long-term warming.
Despite the paucity of evidence, most
climatologists believe that there has been some
global warming since 1880. The question naturally
arises as to whether this warming, if in fact it
exists, is related to human activities and the
greenhouse effect. For a number of reasons, the
answer is probably no.
First, the warming began before the
greenhouse effect could reasonably be expected
to have begun. If it had started or intensified
during the course of the data series, then there
should have been a systematic acceleration of the
warming rate. However, no such acceleration has
been detected.
Second, as we pointed out earlier, the
warming rate is less than half than that which
.o
I o
2
0)
!=• -0.5 -
Figure 1. Long-term temperature records
indicate an apparent global warming of
about 0.5 degrees Celsius since 1880.
This chart shows the annual deviation
from the mean. (After J. Hansen and S.
Lebedeff, 1988)
1875
1895
1915
1935
Year
1955
1975
62
.o
Q>
I
360
350-
340-
330-
320-
310
1955
1960
1965
1970 1975
Year
1980
1985
1990
Figure 2. The level of atmospheric carbon
dioxide has increased by almost 75
percent, presumably from the burning of
fossil fuels but also possibly from the
reduction of forests, since monitoring
began in 1958.
might be expected, even in its early stages, from
a human-induced greenhouse effect.
Third, the spatial distribution of the
warming is also inconsistent with expectations.
The United States, for example, would have
experienced significant warming, yet the study by
Hanson, Maul, and Karl shows none.
Fourth, there is an alternative explanation
for the slow apparent warming over the past
century. From about A.D. 1400 to the middle of
the 19th century, the Earth experienced a
cooling, clearly evident in many long-term
climatological records, known as the Little Ice
Age (Oceanus, Vol. 29, No. 4, pp. 38-39). The
slow warming in the last century may simply
represent a recovery from such a cooling.
Climate is constantly changing, and we
know that this occurs without any human
meddling. Even assuming that the apparent slow,
irregular warming since 1880 is real, there is no
evidence that any of it is due to the greenhouse
effect. Indeed, the warming during the 1980s is
not strikingly different from warming that
occurred earlier in the record. So from an
objective point of view, there's no compelling
evidence of a greenhouse effect.
Policy Making as a Subjective Exercise
In face of such uncertainty, we must obviously
exercise caution in making policy for climate
change. Certain scientists, however, are
convinced that the introduction of uncertainty
changes the problem of policy making into a
purely subjective exercise. As they see it, there is
no need to justify their policy recommendations
on any other basis than their personal feelings.
Although there is an element of subjectivity in all
policy making (just as there is also an element of
uncertainty), a well-developed methodology
exists for incorporating uncertainty in a rational
and systematic way in the policy-making process.
The object is to strike a balance among potential
benefits, potential costs, and the probabilities of
different outcomes.
As with experiments run on climate
models, the information needed for a complete
application of this methodology may be
unavailable. Nevertheless, as with climate
modeling, there is something to be gained by
experimenting on paper with the policy process
(for example, as a way to eliminate clearly
inappropriate policies, or to identify the
information needed to choose between various
viable policies).
It is certainly possible, and probably
desirable, to incorporate caution into the policy
process. This isn't the same as assuming that the
worst possible situation is sure to occur, even it
if has a very small probability of occurring.
Rather, it means keeping in mind that we face
any number of potential global problems with
possible consequences at least as great as those
of climate change. In pondering these problems,
we don't assume that the worst is sure to occur.
We should act no differently in confronting the
prospect of climate change.
How, then, should we act? Any large-scale
policies aimed at a sharp and rapid reduction of
carbon dioxide to the atmosphere are certain to
be expensive. After all, the fossil-fuel burning
that produces carbon dioxide is pursued, not out
of any petulant urge to change the atmosphere,
but to meet essential human needs. Given the
current uncertainties about climate change, and
the unquestioned rise in atmospheric carbon
dioxide in recent years (Figure 2), it would surely
be folly to expand these activities recklessly. On
the other hand, some caution may be
appropriate, especially if there are also other
reasons for it, such as conservation of resources
and the reduction of atmospheric emissions
linked with acid rain.
Because the antidote to uncertainty is
information, and because information takes time
to gather, the proper course of action in some
situations is to postpone an active policy
response while more information is collected.
This option becomes especially appealing under
63
two circumstances: if information gathering is
more likely to reduce uncertainty, and if
postponing an active response is less likely to
cause serious harm. In the case of climate
change, we believe that the value of information
is very great, and that postponing an active
response even by several years is very unlikely to
have a serious impact on the ultimate outcome of
the debate over climate change. Of course, some
of this research should focus on the design of
policies that could be put into place fairly quickly
should further information point to the
likelihood of rapid, costly climate change.
An Instructive Example
One example of the value of new information
seems instructive. In 1980, Stephen Schneider
and Stephen Chen raised the possibility of a 7.6-
meter (25-foot) rise in sea level over the next 150
years. They estimated a property loss of $1
trillion (in 1980 dollars) from this inundation. By
1989, however, Schneider was writing that a 7.6-
meter rise in sea level over the next 150 years
"now seems a low probability" and that most
workers project an increase of one-half to one-
and-a-half meters in the next 50 to 100 years. In
this case, the passage of time (and further
research) may have saved us from a potentially
costly policy error.
There are legitimate reasons for concern
over the possibility of significant and costly
climate change. But if we're to respond
effectively, we need to know more than simply
that the possibility exists. At present, we are left
with substantial uncertainties about the timing,
nature, and magnitude of the prospective climate
change. Our models provide only a crude
representation of climate. They don't perform
well reproducing the recent behavior of climate,
nor do they agree in their forecasts of future
climate. What's more, there is no compelling
evidence in the data that indicates the onset of a
greenhouse effect.
While some see a danger in expressing
even legitimate doubts about the possibility of
catastrophic climate change, there is also a
danger in the way in which the recent discussion
has evolved. By acting as if catastrophic climate
change is lurking around the corner, and by
associating in the public's mind certain short-
term meteorological events like last summer's
heat wave with long-term climate change, we run
the risk of losing the public's attention and
confidence should dramatic climate change not
begin very soon or should there be other kinds
of meteorological events, like a cool, rainy
summer. LH
Selected References
Ramanathan, V. 1 988. The greenhouse theory of climate
change: A test by an inadvertent global experiment. Sc/ence
240: 2293-2299.
Schneider, S. 1989. The greenhouse effect: Science and policy.
Science 243: 771-781.
Hansen, ]., and S. Lebedeff. 1988. Global surface air
temperatures: Update through 1987. Ceophys. Res. Lett. 15:
323-326.
Hanson K., G. Maul, and T. Karl. 1989. Are atmospheric
greenhouse effects apparent in the climatic record of the
continguous United States (1895-1987)? Geophys. Res. Lett.
16: 49-52.
Schneider, S., and R. Chen. 1980. Carbon dioxide warming and
coastline flooding: Physical factors and climatic impact.
Ann. Rev. Energy 5: 107-140.
"We delayed and did nothing, in spite of one environmental
warning after another — and now we're freezing over!"
zr.
it
O
z
o
p
5;
64
The Greenhouse Effect
as a Symptom of Our
Collective Angst
by Jerome Namias
It wasn't too many years ago
that everyone was worrying
about another Ice Age. For
meteorologists like myself, the
inevitable, if slightly jesting,
question from friends and
acquaintances seemed to be:
Should I sell out and move to
a more southerly clime beyond
the reach of the advancing
deep freeze?
Now having satisfactorily
allayed those fears, I find
myself forced to answer
questions about a new
climatological threat. It's not
another Ice Age but rather a
phenomenon called the
"greenhouse effect." As even
kiddies seem to know these
days, the effect is a result of
the burning of fossil fuels and
the increase of certain gases in
the atmosphere, which serve
to heat up the Earth and cause
a general rise in sea levels
from melting of the ice caps,
as well as other climatic
unpleasantness.
So the questions I'm
now being asked are along
these lines: Should I sell my
shorefront property? Should I
head inland?
Doomsday Scenarios
These concerns of lay people
aren't unreasonable. In less
personal form, they are also
the subject of scientific
meetings and of journal
articles, to say nothing of a
'.' I y*
E ven Hurricane Gilbert, which battered the Mexican resort of Cancun
(above) last September, was blamed on the greenhouse effect. (Reuters/
Bettmann Newsphotos)
blizzard of commentary in the
media. The reasons for the
anxiety are plain enough. As
doomsday scenarios go, the
greenhouse effect is more
scientifically based than other
more bizarre possibilities for
climate change that I've
encountered over the years,
such as the impact of atomic
testing, the influence of
satellites, and reverberations
from weapons of war.
Moreover, it is backed by
highly sophisticated numerical
models requiring high-speed
state-of-the-art computers.
These scientific underpinnings
lend a high degree of
credibility to the warnings
Jerome Namias, who has struggled
with the complexities of weather
and climate for more than 50 years,
has been a member of the
meteorology department at the
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Chief of the Extended
Forecast Division of the National
Weather Service, and a research
meteorologist at the Scripps
Institution of Oceanography.
65
about global heating.
And so when last
summer's devastating drought
came to the Great Plains and
elsewhere, it almost seemed a
harbinger of worse things to
come, and for many scientists
who have been warning of the
greenhouse effect for years, it
served as a timely example to
put before a believing public
of what nature might do.
As a result, the
greenhouse effect is now
firmly part of our collective
angst, along with nuclear
winter, asteroid collisions, and
other widely bruited global
nightmares. During the long
hot summer, almost every
example of terrible weather -
from the exceptional dry spell
to Hurricane Gilbert — was laid
at the door of the greenhouse
effect. At the height of the
drought, a poll taken by Cable
News Network showed that 78
percent of the people
interviewed believed that it
was a sign that the greenhouse
effect was already upon us —
though no reputable scientist
made such a claim outright.
What many researchers said
was that more droughts and
more intense hurricanes might
occur in the decades ahead — a
subtly different but still
disturbing claim than that we
are already suffering the
consequences of the
greenhouse effect.
From a meteorological
perspective — the only one for
which one I can vouchsafe real
expertise after more than 50
years in the field — what can we
say for sure about such a
scenario?
In the first place, we
must be prepared to accept
the idea that weather and
climate records, like those in
sports, are always being
broken — everywhere, in any
season, and for any single
element, such as temperature
and precipitation, or for a
combination of elements, such
as big storms or prolonged
spells of abnormal weather.
This is the way the ball
bounces, climatologically: I
would be more concerned if
records stopped falling by the
wayside.
It's true, of course, that
global temperature averages
have risen more than one
degree Fahrenheit in the 1980s
relative to decades about a
century ago. But this rise
shouldn't surprise anyone,
expecially if we consider that
the first part of the global
temperature record is riddled
with uncertainties and scarcity
of observations for many areas
of the world. What's more,
part of the indicated warming
may be due to urban heating -
1936, when an equally if not
more severe drought than that
of the 1 980s devastated the
American heartland, and when
the rise in carbon dioxide
surely was not the culprit. The
same thing can be said for the
droughts of 1952 to 1956 on
the Southern Plains, and for
those of 1962 to 1966 in New
England.
Many of us have been
warning for years that
droughts like the great Dust
Bowl of the 1930s are likely to
I
A Dust Bowl farmer in Cimarron County, Oklahoma, trying to clear
drifting sands from a fence in April 1936. (Courtesy of the National Center
for Atmospheric Research)
that is, the heat produced and
retained by large metropolitan
areas, filled as they are with
concrete and other heat-
retaining material.
The half-dozen
numerical model simulations
aren't unanimous in targeting
the central United States for
more frequent drought in
coming decades, even though
there is some tendency in this
direction. If we assume that
the increase in carbon dioxide
will result in general Earth
warming — a very reasonable
conclusion backed up by all
model results — there still
remain questions of when and
where the warming will occur.
Dust Bowl Memories
Some of us are old enough to
remember the Dust Bowl of
the 1930s, especially the
devastating years 1934 and
happen again. But our concern
is based not on the green-
house threat but on the syner-
gism between atmospheric
wind and weather systems, the
oceans, and the character of
the land itself.
Starting with the fall of
1987, the Great Plains received
little precipitation, and this
deficiency continued into
spring over most of the Plains
states. Also, wind systems over
the North Atlantic and the
North Pacific, together with
the associated sea surface
temperature patterns, were
developing so as to favor
stronger than normal high
pressure areas aloft, with the
accompanying poleward
displacement of the jet stream.
Were these events merely
coincidental, or could they be
linked with the greenhouse
effect? If so, how?
66
The wind systems over
the North Pacific and the
North Atlantic, along with
associated sea surface tem-
perature anomalies,
encouraged the formation of
another cell of high pressure
over the Plains. Under this
high pressure, which prevailed
from spring to summer, the
sun's increased radiative
heating, augmented by
cloudless skies, warmed the
land directly rather than
evaporating moisture from the
soil.
In complex ways, this
heating aggravated the
drought. The increase in the
upper-level pressure over the
United States caused a
corresponding sinking of air
masses. This resulted in a
compressional heating, as the
air was forced to lower
altitudes, and a reduction in
relative humidity. The net
result was a vicious circle of
drought over vast areas,
accompanied by the diversions
of badly needed rain-bearing
storms from the core of the
drought area, and moist air
masses from the Gulf of
Mexico.
As for Hurricane Gilbert,
it isn't possible to prove that it
was partly influenced by some
of this summer activity. The
nucleus of Hurricane Gilbert
came from a big cluster of
thunderstorms that moved off
Africa to help generate the
tropical storm, which
proceeded to move westward
and intensify over warm
surface water in southern
portions of the North Atlantic.
Probably this path was
determined by the strong
Atlantic high-pressure area
described above. It is now well
established that hurricanes
develop and are sustained over
warm water, and if they don't
encounter large land masses,
they won't be destroyed by the
complex frictional effects that
reduce the winds and
counteract the low pressure of
the storm.
Ideal Trajectory
Gilbert traversed an ideal
trajectory over warm water,
increasing the storm's intensity
-si
I
A satellite view of Hurricane Gilbert. The eye of the storm is directly over
the Cancun area. (Courtesy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Adm in is tra tion)
by providing it with more
energy in the form of heat.
Also, in the absence of any
large land masses, there was
nothing in the storm's path to
sap its strength. Short-range
forecasts out to a couple of
days were good; the storm
behaved as predicted, except
for a failure to recurve
northward in the western Gulf
of Mexico. That was probably a
computer failure due to
improper consideration of the
influence of a diverting high
pressure area over the
southern United States.
Nothing in these two events,
the great summer drought or
Hurricane Gilbert, suggests
that the greenhouse effect was
operating. If global warming
by carbon dioxide in coming
decades becomes strong and
regionalized to produce
sustained oceanic warming in
hurricane-prone areas, and
targets maximum heating to
the Great Plains, the events I
described may be signals of
what is to become the norm in
future years.
Still, weaknesses exist in
each link in the greenhouse
theory chain:
There is a lack of
quantitative
determination of the net
impact of many other
trace atmospheric gases
besides carbon dioxide.
Uncertainty exists that
the global warming in
the last century is real
and not transitory.
There are doubts that
the indicated warming
may be definitely
ascribed to the
greenhouse effect.
Disagreements exist
among numerical models
as to the magnitude of
warming or to regional
aspects of
meteorological elements.
• The all-important
question of when it will
take place remains
unanswered.
All these uncertainties
argue against a panicky
initiation of fast counteractive
measures. Why not wait for
more certainty and adapt
gradually when and if some
firmer evidence appears
showing that warming has
really begun? Meanwhile,
because of many other urgent
environmental problems-
pollution of the atmosphere
and oceans, spread of acid rain
and toxic wastes — we should
proceed with all deliberate
speed on conservation
measures.
67
68
Tales of the Future
by Thomas Levenson
Galileo, holding that corrosively novel tool,
the telescope; Galileo, facing his
inquisitors, becomes one of the great
symbols of the modern age, of modern thought.
Galileo took his new tool and looked outward; in
every part of the sky at which he aimed it he saw
wonders, miracles to him and to his fellows. But
Galileo's telescope could not remain fixed only
on the night sky; it twisted in his hand, in the
hands of his age, and pointed inward, toward an
unscientific destination, his soul, toward the core
of his time. The myth has it that when Galileo
confessed his errors and assented to the
orthodox claim that the Earth stood stationary
while the sun revolved around it, he turned away
from his inquisitors and mumbled, not quite
under his breath, "But still it moves." Within that
myth, this truth: the Earth moves.
The fact of motion and the knowledge of
movement transformed Galileo's world, in time.
What endures in legend as a symbol, though, is
not the specific discoveries; they have become
commonplaces, so unremarkable that today it is
almost impossible to imagine how the world
would appear through 16th-century eyes, or how
to believe, as the Church instructed, that the
Earth rested at the center of creation. What
endures is that impossibility and the restless
knowledge that every increment of discovery can
change the world, remake what we see beyond
us, and how we see ourselves within a world of
constant change.
A story from the recent history of climate
science captures the essence of how science
performs this twin act, simultaneously trans-
forming our relationship to the world and
recasting it again within the context of the new
perspective. It involves a feat of pure imagina-
tion, an apocalyptic vision played out on a world
that does not exist; it is the story, thus, of the
conscious effort to produce a myth that could
command belief, and with belief, action.
The story begins with almost a stray
thought, a question that nibbled at the edge of
the questioner's mind until it became impossible
to ignore. In 1981 and 1982 the Swedish journal
Ambio sponsored a multidisciplinary study of the
long-term consequences of nuclear war. The
editors asked Paul Crutzen, a Dutch scientist
working in Germany, to repeat and extend
research documented in a 1975 National Academy
of Sciences report that suggested a novel
mechanism of global apocalypse — the idea that a
major nuclear war could sufficiently disrupt the
atmosphere of the Earth to threaten the survival
of all life on the planet. In the scenario, fireballs
from nuclear explosions would inject large
quantities of nitrogen oxides into the
stratosphere where those compounds could
destroy ozone. Crutzen was asked to update the
atmospheric chemistry in the earlier study and to
produce a scientifically credible scenario of the
effects on the stratosphere of a nuclear
holocaust.
One of the central assumptions of the 1975
study was that a nuclear war would involve a
large number of very big explosions, with both
sides using warheads of one megaton or more.
(A megaton explosion is equivalent to detonating
one million tons of TNT.) However, by 1981,
most of the warheads in both superpower
arsenals had a much smaller yield — America's
Minuteman missile, for example, carries three
warheads each with a yield of about one-third of
a megaton. When Crutzen and John Birks, a
colleague from the University of Colorado,
examined a nuclear war scenario that consumed
larger numbers of smaller warheads, they found
that much of the nitrogen oxides did not reach
the stratosphere, which meant that the ozone
layer appeared to be significantly less threatened
than previously thought.
The last thing that Crutzen wished to do
was to suggest that nuclear war might not be so
bad after all. So the two scientists went back to
look for other damaging atmospheric effects.
They suggested, for example, that the smaller
Thomas Levenson is an associate producer with the
"Nova" science series on WGBH public television in
Boston. This article is excerpted from his book Ice
Time: Climate, Science, and Life on Earth (Harper &
Row). Copyright ® by Thomas Levenson 1989.
69
Every increment of discovery can change the world: The Byrd Glacier in
Antarctica as seen from space. (Courtesy of NASA)
warheads would produce a Los Angeles type
photochemical smog whe/ever the bombs fell.
Then, Crutzen was struck by a sudden
realization: where there is fire, there is smoke;
where there is smoke, there is a shadow; and in
the shade, photochemistry ceases and plants die.
Crutzen and Birks swiftly did a set of simple
calculations on the assumption that a million
square kilometers of woodlands would burn in
the nuclear conflagrations, releasing 400 million
tons of soot into the atmosphere. They
concluded that the cloud of smoke could block
99 percent of the Sun's light from reaching the
surface of the Earth for as long as several weeks.
If they were even close to right, then
nuclear war had become vastly more horrible
than the horror it already was; it threatened, with
its prolonged darkness, the life of every plant on
land and on the surface of the sea. It was not,
this result suggested, just the combatant nations
who were at risk — everybody was.
In itself, the idea of universal annihilation
isn't new. In 1945, the fear was that a single
nuclear weapon could ignite the entire
atmosphere; in the 1950s, people believed that
nuclear war might produce enough radioactive
fallout to kill all life; in the 1970s, as the 1975
study suggested, the foreseen threat involved the
ozone layer. Each of these apocalyptic visions
was discredited in time, however. They all posed
the prospect of some chain of destruction
triggered directly by the initial explosions. But by
the 1980s, it appeared as though the direct
effects of the bomb — blast, heat, and prompt
radioactivity— lethal as they may be, were
essentially local and regional phenomena. Lots of
bombs could kill lots of people; it has been
estimated that a full-scale nuclear war involving a
large portion of the global arsenal would kill a
billion people outright, with another billion likely
to die more slowly from the effects of radiation,
disease, and starvation triggered by the social
disruption attendant on such a war. Even in the
worst case, however, it appeared as if it were
impossible to destroy the entire human world.
Crutzen and Birks had proposed a
plausible mechanism by which the bomb could
cause greater damage through long-term, indirect
effects than through the immediate consequen-
ces of the original blast. Their study also
reaffirmed that the global climate machine was
vulnerable to human action, whether leisurely
changes like the "greenhouse effect," or a
single, swift, catastrophic blow.
Within climate science, Crutzen and Birks's
result crystallized a view that had slowly been
forming from results in apparently unconnected
lines of inquiry. There are enormous dust storms
on Mars, and when one occurred at the time of
the Mariner 9 mission in 1971, instruments on
board the lander observed that beneath the
shadow of the storm the planet cooled. At
NASA's Ames Research Center, James Pollack and
Brian Toon, along with Carl Sagan of Cornell,
formed one of the groups that tried to calculate
in simple models the effect of dust on planetary
atmospheres and temperatures generally,
including those of the earth. Then in 1979, Luis
and Walter Alvarez came up with their theory
that a collision with some extraterrestrial object
produced debris that could have cooled the Earth
long enough to cause the great extinction of 65
million years ago (Oceanus, Vol. 30, No. 3, pp.
40-48). Richard Turco, a researcher at a California
defense think tank, joined with the NASA
researchers to model that event.
So by early 1982, it was known that
immense clouds of dust circulating in the
stratosphere could, in theory at least, affect
global temperatures. Turco used his own model
to try to estimate how much smoke the fires
from burning cities would produce in a variety of
nuclear-war scenarios. Then he calculated the
impact that this much dark, heat-absorbing
material in the atmosphere would have on
temperatures on Earth. In collaboration now with
four other scientists — Toon, Pollack, and Sagan,
joined by another NASA researcher, Thomas
Ackerman — Turco found that for a reference
simulation of the aftermath of a major nuclear
war, mean annual temperatures across the
Northern Hemisphere would drop by as much as
35 degrees Celsius (63 degrees Fahrenheit), and
abnormally cold temperatures might persist for
more than a year. Any survivors of a nuclear war
could, according to this first attempt at
simulation (known as the TTAPS model, after the
initials of the five scientists), simply die more
slowly, shivering in the dark.
This, at least, was the picture painted by
Carl Sagan at a public conference on the
phenomenon, now dubbed "nuclear winter."
The meeting was held on Halloween in 1983, and
the climate modelers were joined by biologists
who had attempted to assess the threat to life on
Earth posed by the climatic effects envisioned by
the TTAPS model. The combination of cold and
dark would be sufficient, particularly for a spring
or summertime war, to disrupt the metabolism of
virtually every plant; the sudden shock would
cause significant dieback and possibly extinctions
that would ripple through the food chain, thus
threatening, perhaps every species of animal
trapped beneath the pall. In the worst case,
according to Paul Ehrlich, rapporteur for the
biological study group, "We could not exclude
the possibility of a full-scale nuclear war
entraining the extinction of Homo sapiens."
There was, in the genesis of the idea of
nuclear winter, a kind of epiphany in the
field of climate science, a coming together
of the disparate strands of research that have
together altered the view we are able to take of
how this planet works. Ideas do not burst forth
whole, like Athena from Zeus's forehead; this
one, at least, grew out of ground that had been
well prepared. The dinosaur extinction problem
is a study in holocaust, and the proposed
solution — the catastrophic collision with an
asteroid or a comet and the cascade of disaster
71
that followed in its wake — gave rise to essentially
the same concept that underlies nuclear winter.
Crutzen himself began to study smoke
after George Woodwell had suggested that the
burning of tropical rain forests was a major
source of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. To
test the idea, Crutzen went down to Brazil in the
late 1970s to collect smoke samples to actually
measure the carbon dioxide content of the
plume. In so doing, he found that Woodwell had
probably overestimated the amount of carbon
that deforestation would release. More important
though, Crutzen began to gain a kind of "feel"
for smoke, a sense of its importance. Martian
dust storms; volcanic eruptions here on Earth
(great eruptions, like Tambora in 1815 or El
Chichon in 1983, which spew out enough dust to
cool the Earth a little); El Ninos, which provide
direct experience of the dynamics of heat
exchange between the atmosphere and the
oceans; acid rain and the fallout from above-
ground nuclear tests, which provide models of
global transport of pollutants; the list goes on,
but all of these events are relevant to the
question of what will happen to global climate
after a major nuclear war. Without all these lines
of research — without the direct experience of
climate change (like living through a major El
Nino, for example) and the slowly gathered
knowledge that has uncovered the links between
place and place, system and system, ocean and
atmosphere and plants and ultimately human
beings — without such discoveries it would be
impossible to imagine the mechanism that could
disrupt the climate system on a global scale.
nd so, in one sense, nuclear winter is
nothing much new. It is simply, like other
rcises in science, an extension of
research that has gone before. It was taken as
both authoritative and credible because it so
clearly echoed research that the scientific
community had already accepted. What on its
face is an amazing claim — that the actions taken
on a single day could transform climate globally
(or at least hemispherically) for months or
more — seems less outlandish when proposed in a
context of dying dinosaurs and a world in which
a change in atmospheric pressure over the
southern Pacific can trigger record rainfall in
Louisiana half a year later.
In another sense, of course, nuclear winter
is absolutely revolutionary. It is incontrovertibly
an exercise in scientifically generated fiction; the
nuclear-winter world is a made-up world, a
make-believe world. It exists entirely within a
handful of computer models, and all the model
experiments include some leaven of "what ifs."
But the nuclear-winter simulation is qualitatively
different from more conventional exercises, such
as those involved in tests of the greenhouse
effect. There is no analogy to a full-scale nuclear
war; there is only the war. Simulations of it are
necessarily explorations of the possible, first, not
necessarily of the plausible. Every such
simulation is based on arbitrary choices — the size
and number of warheads, which targets are hit,
how completely they burn, and so on and on and
on. It follows that claims for given outcomes of
these wars, beyond the the obvious one that the
lives of enormous numbers of people will come
to an end, are equally fictions.
was predicted and announced on
Halloween is only a possible future for
our world. It hasn't happened, obviously
and thankfully, nor is it happening now: this isn't
an experiment-in-progress in the manner that
research on the buildup of carbon dioxide serves
as a kind of global experiment in atmospheric
physics and chemistry. While it uses the methods
of climate science, analogies to historical
climatology, and repeated model experiments,
nuclear-winter research differs from conventional
research in that it is unverifiable, until and unless
we blow ourselves up.
Hence the myth. Nuclear winter is a story
told to frighten us into finding some way to keep
us from finding out — ever— if the prediction is
right or wrong. Visions of the ends of days are as
old as human memory (come Gabriel and blow
your horn), as is hubris, the pride that leads
directly to a fall. Such fears animate the picture
of nuclear winter, the destruction of the Earth
triggered directly by human folly. And we
believe — we believed in 1983 on Halloween -
because those old familiar fears were recast
within the context of a major research tradition, a
rich vein of scientific discovery, all the novel
findings of the science of climate that had
emerged in the last decade.
To recognize the connection between
ancient myth and modern science is not to
criticize nuclear-winter research. Science ought
to generate myths and cannot, in fact, ever keep
from doing so. The existence of nuclear weapons
begs interpretations, some effort to provide
coherence and meaning. Nuclear winter is one of
the results, an attempt to describe what the
experience of a nuclear war would involve.
Similarly, we speak of the greenhouse effect and
illustrate it with a prediction of three months of
90-degree-Fahrenheit heat in Washington, instead
of its usual 35 scorching days each year. We tell
ourselves stories to understand, to persuade, to
force action, to alter or adapt to one part of our
material world or another.
One of the findings in the first study was
of a threshold of safety, of about 100 megatons
or so. If at least that much explosive power were
detonated in an exchange, or even by just one
side, then the smoke produced could still be
enough to generate a cooling large and long
enough to incur most of the disasters predicted
for a much larger war. The only way out, Sagan
suggested at the time and has argued since, is to
reduce global nuclear armaments to a stockpile
of some number of weapons of less than 100
megatons. As of this writing the United States
and the Soviet Union possess jointly somewhere
between 15,000 and 20,000 megatons' worth of
warheads.
73
For obvious reasons, we could share
Sagan's wish to see as many nuclear
weapons eliminated as possible. But Sagan
has fallen into a trap. The myths generated by
science are touched with a special quality that
distinguishes them from the tales of another day.
The glory of the older myths was in their
certainty: If Odysseus's fleet scattered, it was
because Poseidon willed it, and the message was
do not anger the god if you can help it. When
the God of the Jews spared Nineveh after Jonah's
mission of prophecy, the message was behave
well and God will — not might — spare you. But in
science, climate science, the models do not
afford so easy an equation. In the four years
since the Halloween conference, additional
research into nuclear winter has robbed us of the
initial simplicity of the conclusion, and with it the
meaning of the myth that the science still
engenders.
The most recent research has focused on
areas where it is possible with the existing data
and models to reduce at least some of the
uncertainty inherent in forecasts about the world
after the war. The TTAPS modelers used a one-
dimensional simulation in which a certain
amount of smoke was injected into the model
atmosphere and spread evenly over a planet that
was all land or all ocean. After an arbitrary
portion of the smoke (based on their best guess)
was washed away by rain, they then calculated
the temperatures that would result.
In subsequent attempts, several climate-
modeling groups used three-dimensional models
in order to begin with a simulation that could
reproduce many more of the features of real-
world weather. They also began to modify other
specialized models to generate the thunder-
storms that would wash smoke out of the sky,
and they tried, by making surveys of the
burnable material available in cities, to gain a
more accurate account than was available to the
TTAPS team of how much smoke would actually
be generated.
The results of these experiments, taken
together, have led to a reduction in the claims
for the severity of nuclear winter. In the most
comprehensive recent study, Stephen Schneider
and Starley Thompson used their variant of the
National Center for Atmospheric Research
(NCAR) model to refine the original TTAPS
picture. Their version included a mechanism to
rain smoke out, and it produced patchy clouds of
smoke that spread irregularly with the winds and
that dissipated more quickly than the TTAPS
equivalent. The patches meant that some areas
were densely shadowed, which produced a new
climate problem that they called "quick
freezes"— areas that chilled rapidly to below zero
degrees Celsius beneath thick, local masses of
smoke. They also found that their temperatures
varied on large scales, with areas nearer the
oceans cooling less than the middle of
continents. For an average, the NCAR model
indicated that, in a midsummer war, the
temperature drop over the middle latitudes of
the Northern Hemisphere would be about 12
degrees Celsius, which, when various
adjustments have been applied to make the two
model results more directly comparable, turns
out to be about one-third as cold as the original
findings suggested. Most important, while the
larger the war the greater and more varied the
meteorological consequences, the NCAR
scientists could find no threshold, no magic
number of megatons and fires, that would or
would not trigger catastrophic climate effects.
The first thing to notice about this work is
that while the Schneider-Thompson postnuclear
world is not quite as horrible as the TTAPS world
(they, half jokingly, call it "nuclear autumn"), the
climate effects they predict still generate
unprecedented harm. A drop of 12 degrees
during the growing season could destroy much
of a year's crop across the middle latitudes of the
Northern Hemisphere; the quick freezes could
kill plants, as well as any animals and people
weakened for any other reason, even if the cloud
thinned and the frozen areas warmed within a
week or so. The long-term effects of a cloud that
slowly thins out could include late spring and
premature fall frosts, which would impose
chronic stresses on agriculture that could hamper
any efforts of survivors to recover from calamity.
Yet, encouragingly (sort of), the two scientists
also concluded that the chances that nuclear
winter could cause the extinction of humankind
are vanishingly unlikely.
o god out of the machine; nuclear winter
does not deliver us from evil. We know
now more than we knew five years ago.
We know that a nuclear war will have long-term
climate effects; we know that there are, almost
certainly, long-term threats about which we
remain absolutely ignorant. These may, should
the worst occur, cause enormous damage in their
own right. We are reminded once again that
nuclear war is a terrible idea, one to be avoided
at any cost — but that is all.
"I can call spirits from the vasty deep,"
says Glendower to Hotspur. "Why, so can I, or
so can any man; but will they come when you do
call for them?" responds Hotspur. Spirits still do
not answer on demand. The story of nuclear
winter, its rise and fall as a version of global
apocalypse (and hence as global deliverance),
captures the essence of the problems of scientific
myths. Each increment of knowledge tells us
more of our world, of the hazard in which we
live. We know about the slow danger of the
greenhouse effect; we know about the swift
deaths that nuclear war may bring. But such
knowledge only leaves us with a dampeningly
mild admonition; "And now you know a little
more, so act as best you can." The challenge we
face is to reduce the danger of nuclear war, but
this is a task for which science gives no
prescription. Science can offer no certainty, no
one answer, no compellingly obvious way out of
a world in which nuclear war is a daily possibility.
Sagan wishes it would, so does Schneider, so do
74
I, so would anyone, but it does not. We seek
from science what we cannot get — a way out of
our troubles, an easy solution, a gimmick.
What we are given instead is a kind of
mirror, or a telescope that twists and points
inward. The nuclear-winter story provides one of
the triumphs of climate science, this young
science. It is a triumph to have come up with the
pan-subject, the world view, that enabled the
scientists involved to pose the question that
would illuminate the central issue of our day, of
what we are actually capable of doing to
ourselves and our world. It is equally a triumph
to have begun to answer it, with the full armory
of technology and models and historical analogy
and planetary observations and all the details that
cumulatively make up, not the science, but the
grist for the scientist who can assemble the
picture whole.
For nuclear winter, read acid rain, or the
greenhouse effect, or global rainfall patterns, or
the likelihood of excessive storminess this season
or next. The success of the science has been to
recognize the connections between place and
place, time and time, people and all the natural
world. But we do not gain along with that
recognition any obvious methods of remaking
connections lost or broken. Even with increased
knowledge — especially with greater knowledge —
the science leaves us at best with the realization
that there is no simple device out there with
which we can tinker to change the consequences
of any particular human action. It is still up to us,
not to any combination of machines and
inventive systems of thought, to find ways to
escape nuclear war, to find ways to
accommodate ourselves to those changes in
climate we cannot avoid. Nuclear winter is the
extreme case — science has made it clear that
nuclear war is even less desirable than it might
have seemed a few years back — but it still
establishes the paradigm: Science can alert us to
an issue, but the issue itself remains for us to
resolve.
So, in the end, what is the value of this
change in science, this revolution in our picture
of the world? Ultimately, what we get from
science now (in another legacy of Galileo) is the
chance to bring order — not an answer — out of
the chaos of a world transformed at every turn.
That order is the product of imagination, of the
ability both to see into the detail (like Galileo
recognizing that Venus had phases, like the
moon) and to recognize the larger whole ("it
moves"). We look to science with our mixture of
fear (that we will all freeze, that we are not the
center of the universe) and hunger (What can
keep us warm? Where are we?) because it
simultaneously unsettles us and provides the
tales that organize our experience, make it
intelligible.
Galileo said, or we believe him to have
said, "But still it moves." We cannot imagine our
world fixed in place, to this day. Within the com-
puter, we ask what will happen on the sixth day
and on the seventh after a war; we ask what will
happen with another fifty years' worth of carbon
dioxide rising into the sky; we ask where are the
ties that bind us to an entire world. We cannot
now imagine ourselves unscarred by the
consequences of what we do. Our telescope has
turned and focuses today on a world made
whole. We live now within our world, not astride
it. D
Science can alert us to an issue, but
the issue itself remains for us to
resolve: Mount St. Helens erupting in
1980. (Courtesy of U.S. Geological
Survey)
75
.a. ,
i
:f~ \
r."r.i_
How an American scientist survived— indeed,
thrived— aboard a Russian research ship.
by Ronald K. Sorem
A
s glasnost opens more doors, the number of
American researchers taking part in Soviet
scientific projects will certainly increase. Some
marine scientists will surely be among them, for
oceanography has long ranked high as a research
science in the Soviet Union. What can American
scientists expect if they go to sea for weeks or
months on a Soviet ship? What is it like to work
and live in close quarters with the Russians?
In 1986 I had the opportunity to get some
answers to these questions when I spent nine
76
weeks as a guest of the Soviet Academy of
Sciences aboard the R/V Akademik Aleksandr
Vinogradov, one of the USSR's newest
oceanographic vessels, exploring deep seabed
mineral deposits in the Pacific Ocean. For six of
those weeks, I was the only foreigner among
Above, Soviet oceanographic ship R/V Akademik
Aleksandr Vinogradov during a 1986 cruise. (All
photographs in this article courtesy of author)
more than a hundred Soviets.
Vinogradov, 140 meters long and displacing
4,842 gross tons, was built in Poland in 1983 and
sails out of the far eastern Port of Nakhodka, at
Vladivostok. The ship had completed seven
previous cruises. The purpose of our mission, as
stated by expedition head Mikhail Fedorovich
Stashchuk in his proposal to the Academy of
Sciences, was to understand "the regularities of
contemporary authigenic mineral formation on
the ocean floor." These are sedimentary deposits
formed in the place where they are found. An
important practical objective was to look for local
chemical anomalies in the water column that
might be related to useful mineral deposits on
the seabed below.
Stashchuk, a professor at the Pacific
Oceanological Institute of the Far Eastern
Research Center in Vladivostok, began planning
the cruise as an international project nearly a
decade ago, long before the Gorbachev regime
and the new policy of openness. In 1985, he sent
formal invitations to Hokkaido University in Japan
and to several American scientists and U.S.
government agencies in hopes of enlisting as
many as 20 foreign participants for his cruise. He
was greatly disappointed when his overtures to
the Americans were virtually ignored and when,
at the last minute, the Japanese scientists who
had agreed to take part in the expedition were
prevented from joining the ship because it
couldn't get a permit to dock in Japan. The
embargo affected my plans as well: I had flown
to Japan in mid-June and found no way to get on
the ship.
No Docking in Honolulu
Once back in the United States, I received
several radiograms from Stashchuk, urging me to
meet the ship when it docked in Honolulu on 22
July. I arrived there on schedule, only to find that
Vinogradov was still at sea. Coast Guard officials
insisted that the United States never allows Soviet
ships to make port in Honolulu, a fact well-
known to Soviet diplomats. A permit for Hilo was
approved instead.
I arrived at Hilo the day Vinogradov tied up
and was given a hearty welcome. The ship took
on 750 tons of water and several tons of food.
The Russians enjoyed a two-day shopping spree
in the city, and were very cordially received. At
noon, 25 July, we cast off.
As we pulled away, Russians in new Levis
and Hawaiian shirts crowded the upper
weatherdecks, taking photos of each other and
the landscape. We looked more like a cruise
liner than a serious research vessel!
I heard a few words of English and tried
Ronald K. Sorem, a consulting geologist in Pullman,
Washington, was for many years a professor of geology
at Washington State University, specializing in the study
of manganese deposits. His large, well-documented
collection of Pacific nodules was recently acquired by
the Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian
Institution in Washington, DC.
some of the polite Russian phrases I had picked
up during two short trips to the Soviet Union in
1982 and 1984. But I soon realized that I would
need the help of the interpreter, Lena Koltunova.
I was glad to learn that Lena, a congenial young
mother from Vladivostok whose husband was an
engineer on another Soviet ship, would be sitting
regularly across from me at the "geology" table
in the dining room with five or six Soviet
geologists and geochemists.
Lena explained the daily shipboard routine
to me: breakfast at 0730 hours, dinner at 1130,
tea at 1530, and supper at 1930. To work off the
calories, there were such sports as jogging,
volleyball, and weight lifting. Other popular
activities included sunbathing, dominoes, chess,
and the nightly Russian movie at 2040.
The day began with a call over the cabin
The author (in cap) on deck with some of his hosts,
including expedition head M. Stashchuk (third from left).
squawk box, "Dobriya otra, tovarischi..." (Good
morning, comrades). This was followed by "Coot
mornink. Seven o'clock. Time to get up." The
English was obviously for me and, I learned later,
was read from a written script. I asked Lena if I
was a tovarisch — \ had read that "comrade" is
used only for party members. "Of course, you
are included," she said. "You are our comrade!"
Sampling the Polygons
The plan of expedition was to sample the seabed
sediments and the water column in five areas, or
polygons, as the groups of stations occupied in
each area are called by the Russians. Most
analyses of the samples were to be run at sea.
Water chemistry is Stashchuk's specialty and
excellent facilities were available for it. There
were several wet chemistry labs on board, as well
as labs for gas chromatography and atomic
absorption analysis, all fully manned.
Many of the scientists and technicians
came from Stashchuk's institute in Vladivostok,
77
but there were also others from Moscow,
Leningrad, Magadan and Novosibirsk in Siberia,
and Lvov in the Ukraine.
Water samples were collected at various
depths with Niskin-type bottles of several sizes.
Benthic (seabed) samples were obtained by a
pipe dredge and a clamshell-type grab sampler. A
prototype box corer and an impact sampler for
hard rock were tested, but neither saw much
use. Sediment was sampled to a depth of several
meters with a gravity corer, a heavy steel tube
that is sunk into the bottom by its own weight
and then raised to the deck of the ship. The
orientation of all gravity cores was marked to
permit determination of the age of the sediment
by paleomagnetic dating techniques (using the
ancient, or remanent, magnetism of a sample to
tell when it was formed).
Some other technical details of the
shipboard work, all of which were conducted at a
high level: The mineral and microfossil content
and textures of the sediment samples were
determined by microscope study of smear slides
and thin sections. Thin sections of rock samples
were studied by polarizing microscope, and
polished sections of manganese nodules by ore
microscope. Some rock samples containing
opaque materials were also polished for study.
Mineral identification by microscope was
supplemented by x-ray diffraction, and chemical
composition of samples was determined by
computerized x-ray fluorescence equipment and
neutron activation analysis. Facilities for the latter
are rarely found on oceanographic vessels.
I had missed the survey of Polygon I,
located at Lament Guyot, a complex volcanic
structure in the western Pacific south of Marcus
Island, but I was given two detailed maps and a
free choice of manganese-oxide crust samples
from the area for later study. Many samples had
cracked badly upon drying out on board, and I
suggested that a method perfected in our
laboratory— impregnating the samples with
gelatin — be used on fresh samples to prevent
dessication. The method was enthusiastically
adopted. I supplied some U.S. reagent-grade
gelatin, and when that ran out, we raided the
entire supply of cooking gelatin for our samples.
From Hilo, we headed south to Polygon II,
at about 14 degrees North latitude, 153 degrees
West longitude, where the crustal structures
known as the Hawaiian Ridge and the Clarion
Fracture Zone intersect. It was here, in the 1970s,
that scientists on R/V Valdivia, owned by an
international industry consortium, reported a
deep-water positive temperature anomaly. They
measured temperatures of 8.9 degrees and 28
degrees Celsius within 20 meters of the seabed at
two closely spaced stations on two different
cruises. Generally, bottom-water temperatures in
this region of the Pacific range from 1 degree to
4 degrees Celsius.
We soon ran into heavy weather on the
edge of a tropical storm. For six days, all loose
equipment had to be tied down, and roll boards
were needed on the bunks. We heard an
THE 1986 EXPEDITION OF R/V AKADEMIK ALEKSANDR VINOGRADOV
40'
20£
PolygonY^
Juan de Fuca
Ridge
Prince Rupert
Francisco
t
N
0
I
Polygon I
Lamont
Guyot
2,000
Hilo
kilometers
150°
Polygonn
Hawaiian Ridge
& Clarion
Fracture
Zone
_l
180°
Polygon LY
Clarion
Fracture Zone
Polygon ffl
Clarion & Clipperton
Fracture Zones
150'
I20C
78
occasional loud crash as things broke loose in
labs and in the pantry. The crew tried the old
trick of soaking the tablecloths in the dining
room, but still some dishes slid onto the carpet.
Many people lost sleep because of the rough
seas. Nonetheless, the survey and sampling
programs were completed successfully. No
anomaly in water temperature was found.
We set our course for Polygon III to
explore the rich manganese nodule deposits in
the vicinity of the Clarion and Clipperton
Fracture Zones, immense structures in the
bedrock that stretch for thousands of miles east
of Hawaii.
Time Out for Tropical Juice
I had set up shop in the lab equipped for
research in economic geology, a field devoted to
the study of mineral resources. Several stereo
microscopes were available, and I was given a
good ore 'scope lent for the cruise by the famous
nodule worker N. S. Skornyakova. I shared the
lab with two friendly phosphorite geologists and
a mountain of unused gear left over from
previous cruises. The first few days were
uneventful, but one day I found myself in a
crowd of shipmates rushing down the ladders to
the ship's hold. Had the rough seas caused a
leak? No, it was "Tropical Juice Day!" I was told.
According to custom, while the ship was in the
tropics, everyone lined up at the ship's cooler
once a week to get a ration of Bulgarian fruit
juice. Some of the containers were two-liter
wide-mouthed jugs, and I wondered out loud
where we would keep them once the cover was
pried off. Lev Gramm-Osipov, deputy head of the
expedition and my guide, told me that many of
the senior staff's cabins had refrigerators, as did
some labs. My cabin did not.
He offered to let me store my juice ration
in the refrigerator in his cabin, which was right
next to mine. Later he told me that Stashchuk
was embarrassed to learn that my cabin had
neither a refrigerator nor a bath, and suggested
that I bathe in a vacant hospital room with a tub
and toilet. I agreed and promised not to lose the
key, which Lev said was the only one they had.
Finally, he asked if I had a short name and I told
him that people call me Ron. Soon I was on a
first-name basis with all the scientists.
It also turned out that my hosts were
concerned about my laundry, and Lev suggested
that one of the cleaning women take care of it
for me. I understood that the only payment
expected was a small gift before I left the ship.
Later it was my turn to be embarrassed when I
learned that everyone on the ship, from the head
of the expedition on down, does his own
laundry, often by hand.
Wet laundry and clothes soaked by rain
were dried in the upper part of the engine room,
where clothes lines had been rigged and where
A metal dredge bag with bottom samples is unloaded on deck as scientists eagerly wait for their specimens.
79
Shipboard recreational activities include (from top)
musical evenings, volley ball, and parties for foreign
visitors (with interpreter Lena at far right front).
there was always a strong, warm updraft. As luck
would have it, my newly assigned bath facilities
were only a few doors away from the engine
room, and the upper level also was an excellent
place to dry my hair.
During the surveys of Polygons III and IV, I
was on deck for most of the sampling. When the
ship was under way, I worked on manganese
nodules in my lab or someone else's. I often
took a break by chatting with the crew in the
pilot house and checking charts and the
navigation computer screens in the plotting room
next door. Each day at 1130 hours the ship's bell
and horn sounded and the current position was
announced over the public address system. Also
announced were such notable events as the
sighting of dolphins, sharks, turtles, and
whales — or the results of a chess tourney in
Moscow.
Seminars were held in the dining room
about once a week to discuss recent research
results or new plans. My contribution was to
instruct a small group in some of my micro-
mineralogy techniques, a task I found worthwhile
and even entertaining. I was also given a more
urgent assignment. We had been at sea two days
when I was asked to write radio messages in
English to encourage more American scientists to
enlist. I was told they could board ship in San
Francisco when we made port there in about six
weeks. I sent messages to a number of
colleagues but received only one favorable
response. Bill Siapno, a pioneer ocean miner,
agreed to meet us in San Francisco. His vita was
radioed to the Soviet Union and, to Stashchuk's
delight, his candidacy was approved.
I was also asked to check whether we had
been granted a port permit for either Portland,
Oregon, or Vancouver, British Columbia. The
ship wanted to make a short stop in the Pacific
Northwest after working Juan de Fuca Ridge,
Polygon V, before heading back to Vladivostok.
But Stashchuk had not yet received confirmation
of these port calls from Moscow, and was getting
anxious.
Dreaming of San Francisco
To help out, I sent an inquiry to the State
Department, which evidently led to direct contact
between Washington and Moscow on the
stopovers. On 30 July, Stashchuk received word
from back home that Vinogradov would be
allowed to dock in San Francisco on 2
September — but for only one day, not the five or
six days everyone on board expected. Moreover,
we learned that no permits had been given for
Portland or Vancouver. Everyone spent the next
month hoping that our stay in San Francisco
would be extended. "It is our dream," said a lab
partner.
Weeks later, I found out that the water
chemists had a special reason to dream of San
Francisco. They had run short of several key
reagents and asked if I knew of a source in San
Francisco from which they could purchase new
supplies. I sent an appeal to the U.S. Geological
Survey (USGS) at Menlo Park. There was no
reply. But on our arrival at the Army Street
Terminal, I telephoned from the dock and
learned that the survey would rush most of the
needed reagents to the ship.
Most of the ship's company, dressed in
their best, headed straight for town on the
80
nearest bus. They rode the cable cars, shopped,
and visited the parks. There was no sign of
Siapno. To our surprise, the Russians' wish for a
longer stay was granted — on whose authority I
never learned. We could remain until 4
September. That let the Russians give a nice party
and tour of the ship for the small contingent
from the USGS. It also meant a reporter from the
San Francisco Chronicle, Charles Petit, could visit
the ship twice, and my son Keith could fly up
from Los Angeles and spend a night on board in
a guest cabin. Keith, a hotel food executive,
pronounced the cuisine excellent. The meals he
had were just our everyday fare.
On 4 September, at 1400 hours, we cast
off, as required. The Russians were very happy
with their visit but said it was still too short. As
we approached Alcatraz Island, we received a
tmmf^m B^B^M ^•^•••MHM
The author, holding a gift bottle (above left), prepares
to take a launch (above) for a visit at sea to another
Soviet oceanographic vessel R/V Akademik Msistlav
Keldysh (left).
message that Siapno was following us in a small
boat. The master ordered a 180-degree turn at
controlled harbor speed, a rare maneuver for a
large ship, and we got our new recruit aboard.
We steamed northward about 300 miles off
the coast. At my request, the chief engineer gave
me a thorough tour of the engine room. Early on
7 September, we began our survey of Polygon V.
After mapping the southern part of Juan de Fuca
Ridge by echo-sounder, we carried out an
intensive program of hydrochemical and benthic
sampling, on and off the ridge. The positive
manganese anomaly in the water over the areas
of thermal vents was verified, and tons of glassy
basalt, speckled with zinc sulfide minerals, were
dredged. Sediment coring off the ridge was very
successful. On 15 September, we took a break
for "Group Photo Day" and to prepare for a
rendezvous with another Soviet vessel, R/V
Akademik Msistlav Keldysh, the flagship of the
fleet of the P.O. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology
in Moscow.
81
A core of sediment from the sea floor is quickly cut up
for paleomagnetic study (right), then given a
preliminary look with a hand lens.
The next day, we visited Keldysh by
launch. It is said to be the most highly automated
Soviet oceanographic ship in service, with
computerized steering as well as satellite
navigation. We had a lavish lunch (caviar, cheese
and fruit, sausage, Georgian mineral water) and a
tour of the ship, which has a computerized
seismic survey lab and a multichannel laser
spectrograph, then in use for a "gold in
seawater" project. (The availability of this
sensitive new instrumentation has apparently
rekindled among the Russians the old hope of
extracting economic quantities of gold from the
seas.) But the ship lacked the neutron activation
analysis capability found on Vinogradov. Two
Canadian-built Pisces IV manned submersibles
and two unmanned deep-tow vehicles were in
use to make a detailed survey on Juan de Fuca
Ridge. We had a chance to examine live tube
worms and sulfide mineral samples collected the
day before and were given a set of excellent
color photographs taken in the vent area. The
head of the expedition, Aleksandr P. Lisitzin, said
he would like to see an international research
preserve established on the ridge, where he had
already deployed an array of acoustic
transponders and "luminescent lamps" for
bottom navigation.
A Better Opinion of Americans
While on Polygon V, we received word that
Canada had granted a port permit for Prince
Rupert, British Columbia. We headed there 20
September and were welcomed off the Queen
Charlotte Islands by a large and active pod of
whales. En route, I was busy packing my samples
and gear but gladly took time out to attend an
extravagant farewell party given for me in
Stashchuk's comfortable lounge, where we were
served the only whole roast of beef seen on the
entire cruise, along with many Russian delicacies.
All the chief scientists were there, and the affair
was festive, but also sad, for by now we were all
good friends. One of the geochemists said,
"Since you have been aboard, I have a much
better opinion of Americans."
I left the ship at Prince Rupert on 22
September with four cartons of samples and a
large collection of maps, notes, photographs,
and farewell gifts, and a very positive feeling. I
have kept in contact with Stashchuk and Gramm-
Osipov since then. Both hope to get Soviet
support for a professional visit to my lab at
Washington State University by 1990. It will be a
pleasure to repay their hospitality at sea (said to
be typical of Vladivostok, the Russian Far East)
with some of the American Far West.
When American scientists ask what it is
like to work on a Soviet ship, my answer is this:
If you like the sea and have enjoyed your work
on other ships, you will almost surely be equally
pleased sailing with the Soviets. I found day-to-
day life on Vinogradov much like that on the
American research vessels and industry-owned
ships I have worked on, except that the cabins
and the dining room were more comfortable.
Most of the scientific equipment was modern
and worked as well as similar units on other
ships. There was plenty of time and space for
82
Positioning a hardrock sampler for retrieving pieces of cobalt- and manganese-rich crust.
recreation, and friendly efforts were made to be
sure that a visitor did not feel left out. And they
did not have to give me first prize in the photo
contest!
Specific recommendations: Bring a small
portable radio, a camera and plenty of film, a
calendar with some beautiful American scenes,
and a Russian phrase book. Yes, you will have a
language problem, but your attempts to learn
some Russian greetings and other words will be
much appreciated. And many shipmates will be
eager to hear you speak English, American style.
By all means, avoid misunderstandings,
which can happen anywhere. Before you accept
the invitation to join a Soviet expedition, be sure
that you and your hosts agree on what your
research goals and opportunities will be, what
kind of equipment and supplies are available.
And put it all in writing. No one will be
offended, and major surprises will be kept to a
minimum.
A final note: If you enjoy fishing off the
fantail when the ship is on station, be sure to
bring your backpacking rod and some tackle.
You will be surprised to see how many Russians
share your enthusiasm as they use their
"spinnik" to get the squid jig out there where
the big ones are.
Acknowledgment
This report is based on the author's article that
appeared in the December 1988 edition of Geotimes,
published by the American Geological Institute.
Selected References
Beiersdorf, H., H. Gundlach, D. Heye, V. Marchig, H. Meyer,
and C. Schnier. "Heated" bottomwater and associated Mn-
Fe oxide crusts from the Clarion Fracture Zone southeast of
Hawaii. Proceedings of the joint Oceanographic Assembly,
Edinburgh, Scotland, 13-24 September 1976, pp. 359-368.
Petit, Charles. 1986. Red tape snarls Soviet research ship.
Science 234: 145-146.
Sorem, Ronald K. 1986. The Vinogradov Expedition: Why did
the United States miss the boat? Science 234: 923-924.
Sorem, Ronald K. 1987. The 1986 Vinogradov Expedition: Report
on American Participation. 91 pp. Unpublished. (Copies on
file at the National Science Foundation and the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Washington,
DC.)
Sorem, Ronald K. 1987a. Soviet exploration in 1986: Crusts,
nodules, and sulfides, and a proposed joint research area
on Juan de Fuca Ridge. A paper presented at the 18th
Annual Underwater Mining Institute, Newport, Oregon, 4-7
October 1987.
83
sj=i^ U U tsi/
In the Wake
of a Modern Jason
Robert Ballard (left background) looks over his notes prior to a live broadcast from the Jason Project control van
aboard the Star Hercules. (Photo by Joseph H. Batley ^1989, National Geographic Society)
by Diane Herbst
When Hagen Schempf began his graduate
studies in mechanical engineering at the Woods
Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), he
never thought that his years of work would be
lost, albeit temporarily, on the bottom of the
Mediterranean Sea.
But that's exactly what happened when a
cable snapped during a test of the 2,400-pound
robot Jason and its 8,000-pound garage Argo, the
stars of the Jason Project, the brainchild of
WHOI senior scientist Robert D. Ballard — who
hopes to turn on school children to science by
using live television broadcasts from the sea
floor.
"When we lost the system my heart sunk
into my pants. I saw all chances of graduating
before the age of 40 slip away," said the 28-year-
old Schempf, who expects to finish his studies
within a year.
"We all were pretty shocked to see the
hard work we'd put in just disappear," said
project engineer Andrew Bowen.
But the Jason team aboard the mother ship
Star Hercules pulled together like the mythical
Jason and his Argonauts, and within three days-
despite high swells and winds — retrieved the
virtually undamaged system from 2,100 feet of
water on their first attempt. "It was an incredible
feat," said project coordinator David Gallo.
Actually, the Argo/Jason recovery two days
before the first broadcast was only one of many
incredible feats in a two-week, $8 million scien-
tific extravaganza. The Jason Project successfully
used, for the first time, the virtually untested
undersea technology of Argo/Jason with its
13,000-foot fiber-optic cable. It utilized a complex
telecommunications network involving two
satellites to bring the discovery of hydrothermal
Diane Herbst is a freelance writer based in Falmouth,
Massachusetts.
84
Jason is gingerly hoisted to
the deck after recovery from
2, 100 feet deep in the
Mediterranean. (Photo by
Joseph H. Batley ®1989,
National Geographic
Society)
vents and artifacts from a 4th-century Roman
shipwreck to about 250,000 students at 13 sites
around the United States and Canada during the
first two weeks of May. And the project opened a
new era of oceanographic exploration by
enabling researchers to observe as never before
the activity beneath the sea while sitting
comfortably on land.
Hoping for Lasting Influence
Has Ballard succeeded in his aim to interest more
students in science by showing them, as he
repeatedly said "that science is a contact sport,"
that the field requires "teamwork, physical
fitness, and leadership," and is not a world for
"nerds or dweebs"? And can interest generated
by the 84 live broadcasts and subsequent Jason
quests translate into a commitment to science?
Local students and educators gave the
project an almost unanimous thumbs-up as Jason
Project personnel awaited more feedback from
students nationwide. "I'm waiting with my wet
finger in the air," said Fred Douglass, a Falmouth
High School teacher and curriculum coordinator/
educational liason for the the project.
In WHOI's Redfield Auditorium, students
from the Cape and Islands filled the 200-seat
room for six live shows each weekday, with other
viewers watching the live weekend and taped
evening shows. Surrounded by three, 10-foot-
high screens, the audience was led by the
entertaining and indefatigable Ballard, the show's
human star. Ballard, who also hosted six shows
each weekend day, introduced viewers to
"telepresence," as he led them through Jason's
navigations and sea-floor discoveries.
After watching Jason and its manipulator
arm pick up a centuries-old amphora — a double-
handled jug used as a shipping container during
Classical times, the name literally means "carry-
all"-Falmouth Academy seventh grader Bethany
Ziss exclaimed, "This is fantastic, it's just amazing
what they can do!" Tenth-grader John Mayo said
he was impressed with the technology involved
and that the Jason team actually found the
artifacts in the 2,100-foot deep waters. "This
definitely makes me more interested in science,"
he said. A two-way audio hook-up at Redfield
and the 12 museum sites allowed students to
query Ballard or other team scientists. "I was
nervous," said Falmouth High School freshman
Bryan Loughead after he asked Ballard about the
evolution of vent life.
Science teacher Nancy Twichell of
Falmouth Academy said the response has been
very positive. "I think it's been a very beneficial
experience for students. It really allowed them to
see oceanography in action. We'd like to see this
every year," she said.
Twichell and colleague Allison Ament had
a special treat when they accompanied two
students for a day in the "black room" -the
telecommunications center at WHOI's Deep
Submergence Laboratory. There they viewed the
action on 24 television sets, listened to personnel
speak with scientists aboard the mother ship, and
gained a sense of the endeavor's continuity as
they watched one amphora after another rise to
the surface via an elevator.
"You could just see the excitement grow
on the boys hour after hour," Ament said. "None
of us even wanted to leave for lunch."
Many elementary school children would
have liked more time to watch Jason, and
observe life on the sea floor, according to
Falmouth's Mullen-Hall School principal Michael
Ward.
The earlier segments of the event, which
the Mullen-Hall students attended, focused more
on Ballard and the crew, and gave a
85
A Falmouth, Mass, schoolboy considers the path of
Jason Project telecasts from the Mediterranean to
WHOI's auditorium. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst)
technological background way beyond the scope
and interest of the children, Ward said.
"The scientists have to be more attuned to
what a nine-year old is thinking. While a high
school student might be interested in what the
crew is doing, these kids wanted to see more of
Jason and more shots of fish."
A Robot Becomes a Friend
In fact, Jason became more like a friend than a
robot, as a curriculum — prepared by the National
Science Teachers Association — was taught in
schools participating in the project during the
weeks prior to the broadcasts. Ward said that
when Jason was lost, "the whole fourth grade
was depressed. They anthropomorphized the
robot — he became a living, breathing thing. Their
expectations were so high and they weren't
prepared for the tedium of science."
Douglass, who wrote the curriculum
section on ancient shipbuilding and trade for
high school students, said this kind of feedback
is important for planning future Jason curricula.
The Jason team will soon be turning their sights
northward as they plan their next journey, to the
Great Lakes in search of wrecks from the French
and Indian War, the American Revolution, and
the War of 1812.
How long-lasting and far-reaching will be
the enthusiasm of the kids who enjoyed the
shows remains to be seen, said Jake Pierson,
Assistant Dean of WHOI's Education Department.
"I think the concept is great, and all the
feedback I've gotten is very positive," he said.
"But it's one thing to watch a show, it's another
to translate that enthusiasm into making the
committment to study a field."
Pierson said that in recent years, there has
been a steady decline in the number of American
applicants to the graduate program. "It's
worrisome," he said. Although the quality of
applicants accepted remains the same, the depth
of the applicant pool is shallow, with chemistry,
geology and geophysics experiencing the greatest
decline. "But we're not going to compromise our
standards," he said.
Andrew Bowen and an accessory, called "Knuckles, " to
Jason 's mechanical arm. It was used to cradle amphoras
on their trip to the surface. (Photo by Joseph H. Batley
^1989, National Geographic Society)
Hagen Schempf secures a light to Argo's understudy,
the robot Medea. (Photo by Joseph H. Batley ^1989,
National Geographic Society)
"We applaud the project. It's exciting and
it'll take a long time to know the results. But it's
sure been worth the try," he said.
The Argo/Jason technology, developed by
the Deep Submergence Laboratory, enabled the
team to find the first known — and quite active-
vents in the Mediterranean, at the Marsili
Seamount, and to recover scores of amphoras
from a 4th-century Roman shipwreck. And the
use of telepresence, with its clear, crisp images,
may have opened a new window on the world of
the ocean bottom, enabling researchers to
observe as never before activity beneath the sea.
On 5 May, biologist Cindy Van Dover
(Oceanus Vol. 31, No. 4, pp. 47-52) and
geochemist Geoffrey Thompson, both of WHOI,
sat in the black room helping Ballard to direct
Jason's path in the active vent field among gold
and green chimneys with shimmering hot water
86
spewing from them. A computer alongside Van
Dover displayed temperature, depth, and
conductivity data from Jason's probe.
"The imagery is as good as being in a
submersible, and I'm getting some better views
than I would from Alvin's port. I think it's
fantastic to get this kind of live action and visual
coverage," said Thompson, noting that the
system allows scientists a more extended
observation time than is available with research
submersibles. The Argo/Jason technology is "the
wave of the future for bottom sampling and
observation," he said. "And this is just a
prototype, it's going to
be much better."
Project coordinator
Gallo said that while
telepresence certainly
will not replace DSV
Alvin, (Ocean us Vol. 31,
No. 4), it is less costly
and allows scientists
from different fields to
gather together at one
site, view the bottom for
days at a time, and
discuss the finds immedi-
ately. "You rarely have a
mix of disciplines on
board a ship," he said.
Telepresence
images greatly improve
the level of visible detail,
said Van Dover, who was
able to identify bryo-
zoans — microscopic
animals whose colonies
form fern-like mats.
Thompson said that
identification of the
chimney composition,
which either is of
sulfides or iron oxides,
will be confirmed after
analysis of samples.
A young Red Sox fan queries Ballard via satellite on
Mediterranean geology. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst)
A coral polyp
retrieved by the
manipulator arm was delivered to WHOI
biologist Fred Grassle by institution director
Craig E. Dorman, who spent several days with
the Jason team aboard the Sfar Hercules. The
coral, a Dendrophyllid, is not particularly a vent
organism, said Grassle, who suggested an
analysis of seawater to learn more about the vent
fauna.
The site of the shipwreck contains a debris
field with more than 100 amphoras, representing
a period of about 500 years, with some dating to
A.D. 3 or 4. One amphora might date back to 300
B.C., said Sonya Hagopian, project media
coordinator. "That is a real find," she said. For a
week after the television cameras stopped
rolling, the Jason team continued to pluck
amphoras from the sea, preserving them in
seawater on board the mother ship. After their
arrival in Woods Hole, scientists will begin the
slow process of freshwater preservation, said
Hagopian.
'Contact Sport' a Team Effort
The unexpected loss of Argo/Jason, and its swift
recovery, was just the beginning of two weeks of
other exciting experiences for the crew,
particularly the satisfaction of seeing the new
technology work. Schempf integrated the
manipulator arm into the Jason system, spending
months on the project — which up until broadcast
time was still having a few difficulties. He recalls:
"When the arm worked,
it was very exciting.
There was a lot of
screaming and yelling.
And it was the most
exciting thing to see
Jason pick up the
amphoras. Just picture
perfect."
Bowen, pleased
with the vehicle's
performance, said that
this cruise, under the
constant eye of the
television cameras, was
much different from the
rigors of the usual
scientific cruise. "Our
priority was to hold the
kids' interest — that's
what this whole thing
was about," he said.
Schempf said the novelty
of working before
television cameras to put
on a show six times a day
was a constant challenge.
"It's amazing how much
cooperation there is"
between the scientists
and television personnel,
he said. "This is for kids,
and we hope it's
entertaining."
For many of the Jason Project scientists,
the cruise was the culmination of six months of
14- to 16-hour days, said Gallo. "This whole thing
happened only because they're dedicated. I think
the Woods Hole community has a lot to be
proud of," said Gallo. Dana Yoerger, who
worked with the vehicles' control systems, had to
leave his wife and their new baby girl the day
after her birth. "Those guys deserve a hero's
welcome back here. They have made the
institution even more important in science,
technology, and education," Gallo said.
But the entire Jason team, on land and at
sea, needs to be recognized, said Schempf. "This
whole effort would not work if you took just one
person away, it would have just ground to a halt.
Everyone deserves credit."
87
700 Vears Exploring Life, 1888-1988: The Marine
Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole by Jane
Maienschein. 1989. Jones and Bartlett Publishers,
Boston, MA. 192 pp. + xvi. $22.95.
The summer of 1988 marked the centennial of a
revered research institution, the Marine Biological
Laboratory (MBL). To commemmorate this occasion,
Jane Maienschein, a science historian at Arizona State
University, has put together a generously illustrated
biography of the laboratory.
Drawing from archival records and old-timers'
recollections, Maienschein introduces us to a cast of
colorful characters. For this is a story not of the
research performed at the lab but of the people
involved: the scientists and students doing the hands-
on work, as well as the administrators, librarians,
specimen collectors, and caretakers who make the
work possible, not to mention the benefactors who
have helped pay the bills. Vintage photographs
selected by MBL archivist Ruth Davis bring these
people to life.
The author moves back and forth in time, often
using present-day events to draw us into earlier
happenings. She explores themes that have as much
relevance for today's investigators as for those of years
gone by: the inspirational mixing of minds, the
restorative powers of recreation, and the all-too-familiar
scarcity of funding and housing.
MBL began primarily as a summer training
ground for biology teachers. Such a scheme had been
tried in 1873 on nearby Penikese Island by the famed
Swiss-born naturalist Louis Agassiz of Harvard, and, the
next year, by his son Alexander (after Agassiz's sudden
death). The school's brief life and locale made lasting
impressions on its students. Based on his earlier
experiences there, Alpheus Hyatt, who had gone on to
run a teachers' school of natural history in Annisquam,
Massachusetts, was easily convinced by Spencer
Fullerton Baird, founder of the Woods Hole Fisheries,
that Woods Hole was an ideal site to set up a new
teaching laboratory. Charles Otis Whitman, who had
also attended the Penikese school, was chosen to
become the first director. Despite the complete
absence of salary, he kept the position from that
summer until 1908.
Today MBL retains its commitment to education,
drawing to its advanced summer courses in cell
physiology, embryology, neurobiology, and ecology
top-notch students from around the world. But another
side has also developed, separate from formal training:
pure research. Many scientists flock seasonally to this
seaside village — some to collaborate with colleagues
from other institutions. A few stay year-round.
From the start, investigators were drawn by the
abundance of life in local waters. (Another factor in
Woods Hole's favor was cheap land; the local guano
processing company had only recently closed down,
and its presence still lingered in the air.) But as the
years went by, scientists didn't necessarily use local
organisms, let alone marine ones. For example,
Whitman, who studied the behavior of pigeons that he
normally kept in his backyard in Chicago, hauled his
birds to the MBL several summers. And geneticist
Thomas Hunt Morgan brought fruitflies from his "fly
room" at Columbia.
Since the 1960s, a seasonally abundant marine
organism — the squid — has become the star attraction.
Squid contain two unusually long nerve fibers, or giant
axons. Unlike most nerve cells, these are large enough
to insert electrodes into and are thus ideal for studying
nerve impulses. Presently, one-third of the demand for
marine organisms at the MBL is for squid, and, as I can
attest from my four years as a graduate student in the
joint MBL-Boston University Marine Program, many a
summer feast is prepared from their remains.
The MBL has always been highly respected and
influential, and has hosted at one time or another,
more than its fair share of Nobel laureates — 35 to be
exact — whose names are listed at the back of the book.
When Japanese Emperor Hirohito, a practicing marine
biologist, was planning his 1975 tour of the United
States, MBL was the one place he insisted on visiting.
But there have also been a few rough spots in
the MBL's history. During its formative years there was
much debate about just how the MBL should be run
and by whom. Whitman resented the efforts of
nonscientist trustees living in Boston to exert power.
Some of them, on the other hand, felt that Whitman
was trying to build his own empire. A reorganization
soon changed the constituency of the board of
trustees, making the MBL an autonomous body, mainly
-
Clockwise from top left: a
collecting party at Cuttyhunk
Island, 1895; the first
director, Charles Otis
Whitman; the original
laboratory, 1888; the 1897
embryology class, with
Gertrude Stein, front row,
second from left. (Courtesy
of MBL Archives)
controlled by and for the scientists.
The lab has since gone through many other
changes, notably the great increase in scientific
specialization. This is reflected by the famous
summertime Friday evening lectures. Originated by
Whitman as a public forum for the day's important
scientific questions, they now tend to leave many
listeners, even scientists, behind in a dust of jargon.
The author touches on other issues as well,
including the effort of women to make their mark in a
male-dominated institution. Ironically, the photographs
show that women played a significant role in the
earliest days. The author also makes passing reference
to the struggles of Ernest Everett Just, one of the few
blacks in American science in the 1920s. Only the MBL
would provide a scientific home in the United States
for this talented researcher.
The author does not go into great detail on such
issues. She prefers to give us an overview, providing a
feeling for the people and atmosphere at the MBL
rather than an in-depth account. This may whet the
appetite of readers who can go to other sources, some
of them listed at the end of each chapter.
(Frustratingly, however, there is no index.)
Despite the book's lack of analyses, its easy-
flowing text and candid illustrations make it a fine
introduction to the history and achievements of one of
our oldest marine research institutions.
Sara I . Ellis
Editorial Assistant
Oceanus
89
Catastrophic Coastal Storms by David R. Godschalk,
David J. Brovver, and Timothy Beatley. 1989. Duke
University Press, Durham, NC. 275 pp. + x. $47.50.
The specter of accelerating climate change
accompanied by higher sea levels and increased storm
activity has many coastal towns worried about their
future. What impact will these potential events impose
on communities' infrastructure and tourism? What is
the best management policy for these areas, and how-
does a coastal town obtain guidance and financial help
with coastal management? These driving questions are
among those addressed by the authors in their study of
catastrophic coastal storms.
The book is well written in general and
presented at a level not so specific as to lose the
nontechnical reader. It addresses the accepted natural
hazard management model, which consists of a four-
stage process: mitigation, preparedness, response, and
recovery. The primary focus, however, is on mitigation,
the one element of the natural hazard model that has
been most neglected in the past. The emphasis is on
"bottom-up" mitigation — starting with a local disaster
mitigation program — developed in the context of the
overall intergovernmental framework.
The most effective mitigation strategy, in the
view of the authors, is one that manages growth and
development to keep infrastructure away from the
areas where storm forces will be greatest. While this
position is tenable for undeveloped coastal regions, it's
not clear how this strategy would be applied to coasts
that are already heavily developed. The authors focus
on development management as the primary mitigation
(alteration of the shoreline, strengthening buildings
and facilities, and evacuation, for instance). While this
slant may not have been intended by the authors, it
does detract from the completeness of the
presentation, particularly for heavily developed coastal
areas. However, the general theme, that of managing
growth and development in hazard-prone areas, is a
laudable one that must form the basis for much of our
coastal mitigation program.
Although the theme of development
management has been making the rounds of the policy
circuit for a long time, this book goes beyond simple
platitudes and offers some solid recommendations:
establishment of a comprehensive set of storm hazard
mitigation performance standards; reorientation of
federal expenditures related to mitigation, to reward
state and local programs that meet the performance
standards; and incorporation of the mitigation
standards into state and local development
management plans and programs that actually guide
coastal development. The authors conclude with a
detailed description of how to derive effective local
mitigation strategies, including ways to overcome local
adoption and implementation obstacles.
Federal policy support for local hazard mitigation
is discussed, including the need to overcome the cycle
of build-destroy-rebuild presently fostered by federal
programs. Unfortunately, the book was published just
as the Upton-Jones amendment to the Flood
Emergency Act (FEMA) was passed, so this positive
advance made by the federal sector is acknowledged
only by footnote at the end of the final chapter. The
amendment encourages local government to declare
structures as imminently endangered. This allows
structure relocation to become an eligible insurance
loss claim if relocation occurs sufficiently far from the
hazard area (for instance, behind the 30-year coastal
set-back line- that is, the projected shoreline 30 years
in the future, based on the current rate of local
erosion). If relocation were not performed soon
enough, and the structure suffered subsequent
damage, the insurance claim could not exceed 40
percent of the insured value. This policy thereby
minimizes the costs of future claims by encouraging
timely relocation. It is also funded through insurance
premiums, and therefore does not require new
appropriations.
The authors recommend that the National Flood
Insurance Program, administered by FEMA, be
reoriented to encourage operations more similar to a
conventional, private insurance company, with variable
rates tied to the relative risk of various policy holders,
even to the point of canceling insurance for policy
holders in zones where the risks are too high. Finally,
they discuss how to implement coastal mitigation
management most effectively on a local level, including
arguments to overcome some of the common
objections to mitigation planning.
This volume provides a useful management tool
for coastal communities. It reviews the development of
coastal emergency management, and provides
appropriate guidelines for local mitigation of coastal
flooding (due to storms, rather than potential longer-
term sea-level rise). Coastal communities that feel a
need for guidance in mitigation management should
benefit from its insights.
David C. Aubrey
Director, Coastal Research Laboratory
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
90
SHARKS
v J I If VI VI VcJ
QUESTION
TOR /Jv SPRINGER
lOyPGOLD
Sharks in Question: The Smithsonian Answer Book by
V. G. Springer and J. P. Gold. 1989. Smithsonian
Institution Press, Washington, DC. 187 pp. $39.95.
For those marine biologists, amateur naturalists,
museum docents, and so many others who have always
felt a certain queasiness when attempting to answer
questions like: "Why are sharks unchanged over time?
Won't the shark die if it stops swimming? How smart
are sharks? What should I do if I'm attacked by a
shark?" and the ever-favorite, "How are sharks
different from fish?" your prayers have been answered.
Like all museum professionals, the authors were
besieged by the above-mentioned questions and so
many more after a local shark attack, or the nearby
discovery of a fossil shark tooth. (The phenomenon of
besiegement by questions also peaks during Science
Fair and when science term papers are due.) Springer,
a distinguished ichthyologist with the Smithsonian's
Fish Division, and Gold, a Technical Information
Specialist in its Department of Vertebrate Zoology,
decided to compile the typical questions and their
answers in a novel format, along with just enough basic
elasmobranch (shark and ray) biology to update a rusty
biology graduate or challenge an interested novice.
Much has been learned about sharks in the last
few decades, aided in part by the U.S. Navy's concern
for their personnel and equipment, and subsequently
by the public's interest in the subject since Peter
Benchley's book and {\\mjaws. Several natural history
films have recently brought scientists and filmmakers
together to enter the shark's milieu at Hollywood's
expense, and the result has certainly whetted the
public appetite and occasionally added to the
confusion. Current research has largely turned away
from a search for shark repellents and directed itself
more to the sensory modalities and abilties of
elasmobranchs. The rising commercial market for shark
flesh in a protein-short world has reminded us how
little we know about the natural history of most (or
any!) of today's 350 species of sharks. This book
touches on each of these points, and answers —
although not exhaustively- many more; and it properly
culminates with the question: "What is left to learn
about sharks?" (The answer: lots.)
The book is organized in five sections, followed
by a useful glossary; bibliographies of general, popular,
and technical literature; and an index. Numerous line
drawings, as well as sixteen color plates of adequate
quality (but modest size) illustrate various shark
behaviors, species, and anatomical parts. The first part
answers the basic anatomical, evolutionary, and
behavioral questions, and ends with a synoptic
description of the nine orders of living sharks. Part two
focuses on the biology of "supersharks," the large,
dangerous, and charismatic species. Part three is a brief
but obligatory treatment of the danger of shark attack,
beginning with "How serious is the threat?" (not great
unless you are a victim — less than 100 annually
reported worldwide, with about 30 fatalities); and
continuing with "Which sharks are dangerous?" (only
21 species); "Why do sharks attack humans?"
(biologists are not sure, but they have some good
ideas — I won't give them away here); and "Are there
any effective shark repellents?" (no). Part four concerns
"sharks and us," and asks: "Of what use are sharks?
How can I become a shark specialist?" and "What is
left to learn about sharks?" Part five contains
appendices of shark classification, common and
M icntific names, and maximum and minimum lengths
of -Delected species.
The book has undergone a careful reading and
editing by several experts in the field. Areas of
controversy among elasmobranch biologists are
identified and treatment is given to different points of
view. Errors are few and trivial. In fact, the book is so
complete that I'm afraid many high school students will
use it as the sole source for their various papers. On
the other hand, the good ones probably won't, and
some may become inspired to pursue a career in this
or a similar field.
John E. McCosker
Director, Steinhart Aquarium
California Academy of Sciences
San Francisco
A Note to Teachers
We offer a 25-percent discount on bulk
orders of five or more copies of each current
issue — or only $4.12 a copy. The same
discount applies to one-year subscriptions
for class adoption ($17.00 per subscription).
Teachers' orders should be sent to
Oceanus magazine, Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA
02543. Please make checks payable to
W. H.O.I. Foreign checks should be payable
in dollars drawn on a U.S. bank.
91
Shark, a Photographer's Story by Jeremy Stafford-
Deitsch. 1988. Sierra Club Books. San Francisco, CA.
200 pp. $16.95.
I saw my first shark (an oceanic whitetip), while I was
leaning over the rail of R/V Atlantis in the Windward
Passage about 35 years ago. At that time you probably
didn't need more than the toes on one foot to tally up
all the available underwater pictures of sharks in the
wild. Certainly, you would have found it next to
impossible to have located any that had been taken
close up, in focus, well composed, and in color.
Shadows in the Sea, for example, a popular shark book
first published 1963, didn't contain a single underwater
picture, good or bad. By contrast, this book has dozens
of superb photographs of sharks in their natural
habitat.
We owe such photography largely to the great
surge in professional and amateur underwater
exploration in the 1960s and '70s, as well as to the
advances in diving gear and cameras that accompanied
and encouraged all this activity. But it is also a tribute
to the energy, perseverance, skill, and courage of the
photographers themselves who often seem willing to
risk all in their quest of sharks.
But this book isn't just a collection of pictures.
It's a natural history of sharks, principally of the larger
and more conspicuous kinds that divers and other sea-
goers are sometimes lucky enough to see. Author/
photographer Stafford-Deitsch nicely weaves together
zoology and his own considerable underwater
experience with these much maligned animals.
Unfortunately, his fine photographs are ill-served
by the book's design. Of the 70 or so photographs that
occupy a page or more, at least 30 have been done
substantial damage because they're cut in critical places
by the margin between facing pages. For example, on
pages 17 and 18, designer Nigel Partridge should have
let the gutter sever the diver instead of the shark. And
on pages 55 and 59, there's enough white space to the
right of the eagle ray, a kin of the shark, so that this
fine fish needn't have been beheaded.
One can only be left to wonder how many cold,
wet, tired hours Stafford-Deitsch spent underwater
before he got the wonderful picture of the mako on
pages 132 and 133, only to have it butchered by
somebody sitting warm and dry before a studio table
on King's Cross Road in London, where the book was
produced.
Stafford-Deitsch doesn't claim to be a scientist
(he majored in philosophy at London University). But
his biology seems correct to me and his field natural
history is first-rate. Wherever he and I intersect in
experience (mostly in dealing with oceanic sharks), he
seems to be right on target, and I'm willing to believe
what he tells me about those many things of which he
knows so much more than I do. His sea stories are well
tempered and ring true. He's a good writer, even
poetic now and then, and I really enjoyed reading this
reasonably priced book. It's too bad that both pictures
and text are dragged down by the shortcomings of
design.
Richard H. Backus
Senior Scientist Emeritus
Biology Department
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
JEREMY STAFTORD-rMTSCH
Foreword by Professor Samuel H Gruber
Marine Policy for America, Second Edition, Revised and
Expanded, by Gerard J. Mangone. 1988. Taylor &
Francis, New York, NY. 365 pp. $40.00.
"Marine policy is public policy." So begins the final
chapter of Gerard Mangone's second edition of Marine
Policy for America. Not theoretical, or even analytical in
a disciplinary sense, the book is the only comprehen-
sive, historical treatment of the field. Its structure is an
accurate, sometimes precise, reflection of the
institutions that create and carry out U.S. public policy
near, on, or under the oceans, and of the issues they
face. Those who believe that marine policy only
emerged with the environmental movement in the late
1960s have a lot to learn from this book. For those who
have allowed themselves to become caught up in the
excitement of recent presidential proclamations
extending U.S. ocean jurisdictions, this book is
mandatory reading.
Mangone, director of the Center for the Study of
Marine Policy at the University of Delaware, clearly is
aware of the difficulties in characterizing a field with a
scope as broad as marine policy. He writes:
It is often asked whether the United States has a
marine policy. In the sense of a single,
comprehensive, integrated statement or formula,
the answer must be "no." ... [There are] such a
diversity of problems and issues, such a mix of
constituents and public interest, and such a wide
distribution of responsibility within the American
government that any search for a single policy
would be futile.
This statement must alarm those who seek simple
solutions to persistent problems in ocean governance.
Mangone reminds us that posing institutional solutions
92
:MPL;
is easy, but that achieving them is more difficult and
often ephemeral. Indeed, he remarks bluntly that one
of the common "solutions" to problems of marine
policy — that of creating a single, national ocean
agency— is a chimera. If such an agency were in fact
established, it would merely "engender an octopus
with fissiparous tendencies."
The absence of a single marine policy for the
United States could have presented a problem for the
author as well, but his treatment is well-organized and
even. There are seven chapters, focusing respectively
on: Early America and the Sea, The Navy and American
Security, the Merchant Fleet of the United States,
Fisheries and Foreign Policy, the Continental Shelf and
Seabed Minerals, Marine Pollution, and Formulation
and Administration of Marine Policy. Each chapter is
completed with a section on "problems and issues," a
synopsis of historical events in combination with some
limited forecasts. Through a series of polished essays,
Marine Policy for America largely succeeds in
presenting an integrated view of historical events that
frame future possibilities.
Indeed, any book on marine policy that includes
both Herodotus and Henry Ford between its covers
ought to invite considerable attention. We learn to
attribute the late-18th-century concept of a territorial
sea to Ferdinando Galiani, who was, appropriately, an
economist. We discover that Alexander Agassiz, the
successful copper magnate, was hauling up manganese
nodules at the turn of the century, and that a long line
of philosophers has been interested in the effects of
man on climate. Among them: Hugh Williamson, who
suggested in 1760 that climate might be altered to "gain
more moderate temperatures and salubrious airs!"
The reader, however, is left asking for more. And
a few statements indicate, almost by design, that there
is more. Again, with regard to constructing institutions
for governance, Mangone explains that:
The game of organizational arrangements can be
played by anyone, yet the principle of vertical
specialization for the application of policy and the
lateral review of performance by disinterested
parties should not be forgotten.
Had this meaty thesis appeared in the first chapter,
instead of the last, and been developed with the
plethora of factual accounts that fill its pages, Marine
Policy for America could have laid a paradigmatic
foundation for the field.
But such criticisms are merely afterthoughts.
Without Mangone's considerable effort, we would
remain mired in ignorance, muddlers at best. This is a
valuable work, well-referenced and indexed. The
second edition includes more figures and tables than
the first, and the new typeface and layout enhance
readability. It should be within reach of any
government official with even a tangential responsibility
for ocean management, as well as research specialists
who need to accelerate quickly on marine issues with
which they have little familiarity.
Porter Hoagland III
Research Associate
Marine Policy Center
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
The Crest of the Wave: Adventures in Oceanography
by Willard Bascom. 1988. Harper & Row, New York,
NY. 317 pp. + xiv. $19.95.
Willard Bascom has had (and is still having) a wonderful
life. He has seen and been involved with many exciting
things, most of which involve the ocean. In this
charming book he shares some of his experi-
ences with us. Parts of his story were almost deja vu for
me, involving similar people and events, but 15 years
later in time.
Bascom's story starts in 1945 when, as a young
mining engineer, he was attracted to oceanography by
John Isaacs, who was then a young teacher at Scripps
Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. (As
an aside, somebody should write a book about Isaacs,
who has influenced so many people.) With Isaacs,
Bascom made an amazing series of beach surveys
risking life and limb to learn about waves off the West
Coast of the United States. Later he was indirectly
involved in the Bikini A-bomb tests, had a series of
experiences with land-based mining operations, then
became involved with oceanography at Scripps, in
particular in the Capricorn Expedition in the Pacific
Ocean. Along the way he successfully came through a
bout with cancer.
Bascom spent a few years in Washington at the
National Research Council where, among other things,
he helped develop the Moho Project, and was one of
the leaders of its successful first phase, the CUSS I
expedition off San Diego. The Moho Expedition was an
attempt to drill through the earth's crust to the mantle
reaching the Mohorovicic discontinuity, or Moho, the
boundary between the crust and mantle; it did not
93
succeed because of political problems concerning the
awarding of the drilling contracts. Subsequently he
went off to mine diamonds off the coast of Africa, and
formed the Ocean Science and Engineering Company
(with several others).
Next he went looking for treasure ships in the
Caribbean. Unsuccessful, he returned to California and
headed up the Southern California Coastal Water
Research Project. Finally, we find Bascom working back
at the National Academy of Sciences with satellites and
sailing vessels. One could get the mistaken impression
that he cannot hold a job. Just the opposite: he leaves
when things get boring or something more exciting
beckons.
Along the way, the reader meets Bascom 's
compatriots, names well known in oceanographic
circles. Besides Isaacs, there's Al Vine, Walter Munk,
Roger Revelle, Russ Raitt, Giff Ewing, Art Maxwell, John
Knauss, George Shor, Richard Von Herzen, among
others, and it is a lovely trip. I only overlapped for a
few minutes of Bill's career, and every second of that
time is memorable. Read this book if you want to learn
how oceanography was before scientists and engineers
had to worry about mundane things like budgets,
government regulations, department chairmen, and
more.
David A. Ross
Chairman, Geology and Geophysics Department
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
The
ceanography.
Books Received
Biology
The Coralline Red Algae by
William J. Woelkerling. 1988.
Oxford University Press, New
York, NY 10016. 268 pp. + xii.
$85.00.
Marine Microbiology by B. Austin.
1988. Cambridge University Press,
New Rochelle, NY 10801. 222 pp.
+ xii. $59.50.
Microbial Ecosystems of Antarctica
by Warwick F. Vincent. 1988.
Cambridge University Press, New
Rochelle, NY 10801. 304 pp. + x.
$75.00.
On Lampreys and Fishes: A
Memorial Anthology in Honor of
Vladim D. Vladykov edited by Don
E. McAllister and Edward Kott.
1988. Kluwer Academic Publishers
Norwell, MA 0206 1. 162 pp. $83.00.
Peacemaking Among Primates by
Frans de Waal. 1989. Harvard
University Press, Cambridge, MA
02138. 294 pp. + xiv. $29.95.
Pelagic Snails: The Biology of
Holoplanktonic Gastropod
Mollusks by Carol M. Lalli and
Ronald W. Gilmer. 1989. Stanford
University Press, Stanford, CA
94305. 259 pp. + xvi. $49.50.
Sensory Biology of Aquatic
Animals edited by Jelle Atema,
Richard R. Popper, Arthur N.
Popper, and William N. Tavolga.
1988. Springer- Verlag, Secaucus,
NJ 07096. 936 pp. + xxxvi. $169.00.
Stable Isotopes in Ecological
Research edited by P. W. Rundel,
J. R. Ehleringer, and K. A. Nagy.
1988. Springer- Verlag, Secaucus,
NJ 07094. 525 pp. + xvi. $89.00.
Tuna and Billfish. Fish Without a
Country by James Joseph, Witold
Klawe, and Pat Murphy. 1988.
Inter-American Tropical Tuna
Commission, La Jolla, CA 92093.
69 pp. + xi. $15.75.
Turtles and Tortoises of the World
by David Alderton. 1988. Facts on
File, New York, NY 10016. 191 pp.
$22.95.
The Ultrastructure of Polychaeta
edited by Wilfried Westheide and
Colin O. Hermans. 1988. Gustav
Fischer Verlag, New York, NY
10010. 494 pp. $77.00.
Children's Books
The Ocean Alphabet Book by Jerry
Palota with illustrations by Frank
Mazzola, Jr. 1989. Charlesbridge
Publishing, Watertown, MA 02172.
32 pp. $11.95.
The Rock Pool by David Bellamy,
with illustrations by Jill Dow. 1988.
Clarkson N. Potter, New York, NY
10003. 26 pp. $9.95.
The Scientific Kid: Projects,
Experiments and Adventures by
Mary Stetten Carson. 1989. Harper
& Row, New York, NY 10022. 80
pp. $9.95.
Sunken Treasures by Gail Gibbons.
1988. Thomas Y. Crowell, New
York, NY 10022. 32 pp. $12.89.
94
Earth Science
Basement Correlation Across the
North Atlantic by Jean-Pierre
Lefort. 1989. Springer- Verlag,
Secaucus, NJ 07096. 148 pp. + xii.
$59.00.
Drifting Continents and Shifting
Theories by H. E. Legrand. 1988.
Cambridge University Press, New
Rochelle, NY 10801. 313 pp. + vi.
$49.50.
The Ocean Basins: Their Structure
and Evolution edited by Gerry
Bearman. 1989. Pergammon Press,
Elmsford, NY 10523. 171 pp. $17.95.
Siliceous Deposits of the Tethys
and Pacific Regions edited by J. R.
Hein and J. Obradovic. 1989.
Springer-Verlag, Secaucus, NJ
07094. 244 pp. + x. $69.00.
Volcanic Hazards: Assessment and
Monitoring edited by John H.
Latter. 1989. Springer-Verlag,
Secaucus, NJ 07096. 625 pp. + xiv.
$98.00.
Environment
Balancing the Needs of Water Use
by James W. Moore. 1989.
Springer-Verlag, Secaucus, NJ
07094. 267 pp. + xi. $69.00.
The Delaware Estuary:
Rediscovering a Forgotten
Resource edited by Tracey L.
Bryant and Jonathan R. Pennock.
1988. University of Delaware Sea
Grant College Program, Newark,
DE 19716. 144 pp. $20.00.
Living with Chesapeake Bay and
Virginia's Ocean Shores by Larry
G. Ward, Peter S. Rosen, William
J. Neal, Orrin H. Pilkey, Jr., Orrin
H. Pilkey, Sr., Gary L. Anderson,
and Stephen J. Howie. 1989. Duke
University Press, Durham, NC
27708. 236 pp. + xiv. $12.95.
Living with the Coast of Maine by
Joseph T. Kelley, Alice R. Kelley,
and Orrin H. Pilkey, Sr. 1989.
Duke University Press, Durham,
NC 27708. 174 pp. + xvi. $10.95.
Oceans of Plastic edited by Sue
Keller. 1988. Alaska Sea Grant
College Program, Fairbanks, AK
99775. 41 pp. + vi. $5.00.
Pollution of the North Sea: An
Assessment Edited by Wim
Salomons, Brian L. Bayne, Egbert
K. Duursma, and Ulrich Forstner.
1988. Springer-Verlag, Secaucus,
NJ 07096. 687 + xii. $113.00.
Using Oil Dispersants on the Sea
edited by Andrea Corell. 1989.
National Academy Press,
Washington, DC 20418. 335 pp. +
xvi. $29.95.
Field Guides
Beachcomber's Guide to the Gulf
Coast Marine Life by Nick
Fotheringham and Susan
Brunenmeister. 1989. Gulf
Publishing, Houston TX 77252. 142
pp. + x. $12.95.
A Field Guide to the Fishes of
Galapagos by Godfrey Merlen.
1988. Wilmot Books, London
England SW3 5EL. 60 pp. $12.00.
Florida's Fossils: Guide to
Location, Identification, and
Enjoyment by Robin C. Brown.
1988. Pineapple Press, Sarasota, FL
16008. 208 pp. $21.95.
Marine Plants of the Caribbean by
Diane Scullion Littler, Mark M.
Littler, Katina E. Bucher, and James
N. Norris. 1989. Smithsonian
Institution Press, Washington, DC
20560. 263 pp. $14.95.
Sea Life of Britain and Ireland
edited by Elizabeth Wood, with
foreward by David Bellamy. 1988.
IMMEL Publishing, London,
England W1X 3RB. 240 pp. £14.95.
General Reading
The Cosmic Blueprint: New
Discoveries in Nature's Creative
Ability to Order the Universe by
Paul Davies. 1988. Simon &
Schuster New York, NY 10020. 224
pp. + x. $8.95.
Genethics: The Clash Between the
New Genetics and Human Values
by David Suzuki and Peter
Knudtson. 1989. Harvard University
Press, Cambridge, MA 02138. 384
pp. $25.00.
Infinite in All Directions by
Freeman Dyson. 1988. Bessie/
Harper & Row, New York, NY
10022. 319 pp. + vii. $8.95.
Koviashuvik: A Time and Place of
Joy by Sam Wright. 1988. Sierra
Club Books, San Francisco, CA
94109. 214 pp. $17.95.
THE FUNDAMENTALS
OF CTD ACCURACY
Because Sea- Bird's modular
sensors make calibration so
easy and economical, Sea-
Bird users have amassed an
unprecedented history of
documented accuracy and
stability.
No other CTD offers so
direct a link between fun-
damental standards and
field performance.
Every Sen Bird temperature
and conductivity sensor is
calibrated against funda-
mental standards by the
c^j>, Northwest Regional Calibra-
tion Center, an independent
contractor to the United
States Government.
Sea Bird Electronics, Inc 1808- 136th Place NE Bellcvut, Washington 98005 USA
Telephone: ( 206) 643-9866 • Telex: 292915 SBEI t'R • Telefax: ( 206) 643 9954
95
Parallel Universes: The Search for
Other Worlds by Fred Alan Wolf.
1989. Simon & Schuster, New
York, NY 10020. 351 pp. $19.95.
A Pictorial History of Diving edited
by Arthur J. Bachrach, Barbara M.
Desiderati, and Mary M. Matzen.
1988. Best Publishing, San Pedro,
CA 90732. 149 pp. $83.00.
Plants Beyond: Discovering the
Outer Solar System by Mark
Littman. 1988. John Wiley & Sons,
Somerset, NJ 08875. 286 pp. + xvi.
$22.95.
Science and Technology in Post-
Mao China edited by Denis Fred
Simon and Merle Goldman. 1989.
Harvard University Press,
Cabridge, MA 021 38. 461 pp. +
xvi. $14.00.
Sea-Brothers: The Tradition of
American Sea Fiction from Moby-
Dick to the Present by Bert Bender
with drawings by Tony Angell.
1988. University of Pennsylvania
Press, Philadelphia, PA 19104. 267
pp. + xvi. $29.95.
Sexual Science: The Victorian
Construction of Womanhood by
Cynthia Eagle Russet. 1989.
Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, MA 02138. 245 pp.
$25.00.
Time Wars: The Primary Conflict
in Human History by Jeremy
Rifkin. 1989. Simon & Schuster,
New York, NY 10020. 302 pp.
$9.95.
Turbulent Mirror: An Illustrated
Guide to Chaos Theory and the
Science of Wholeness by John
Briggs and F. David Peat. 1989.
Harper & Row, New York, NY
10022. 222 pp. $22.50.
Voices from the Deep: The Scuba
Diving Experience in
Contemporary Poetry edited by
Vera Schoen. 1988. Harrowood
Books, Newton Square, PA 19073.
181 pp. + xvi. $10.00.
The Weather Companion: An
Album of Meteorological History,
Science, Legend, and Folklore by
Gary Lockhart. 1988. John Wiley &
Sons, New York, NY 10158. 230 pp.
$12.95.
Marine Policy
Deep Water: Development and
Change in Pacific Village Fisheries
by Margaret Critchlow Rodman.
1989. Westview Press, Boulder, CO
80301. 173 pp. $18.95.
International Navigation: Rocks
and Shoals Ahead? edited by Jon
M. Van Dyke, Lewis M. Alexander,
and Joseph R. Morgan. 1988. Law
of the Sea Institute, Honolulu, HI
96822. $35.00.
Persistent Marine Debris:
Challenge and Response: The
Federal Perspective by Kurt Byers
and Sue Keller. 1988. Alaska Sea
Grant College Program, Fairbanks,
AK 99775. 41 pp. + vi. Free.
The Problem of Waste Disposal
edited by Robert Emmet Long.
1989. H. W. Wilson, Bronx, NY
10452. 213 pp. $12.00.
A Workbook of Practical Exercises
in Coastal Zone Management for
Tropical Islands by Peter R. Bacon,
Compton A. Deane, and Allen D.
Putney. 1988. Commonwealth
Science Council, London England
SW1Y5HX. £14.00.
Physical Science
Fluid Physics for Oceanographers
and Physicists: An Introduction to
Incompressible Flow by Jerome
Williams and Samuel A. Elder.
1989. Pergammon Press, Elmsford,
NY 10523. 300 pp. + x. $27.50.
Hydrodynamics of Estuaries,
Volume II by Bjorn Kjerve. 1988.
CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL 33431.
710 pp. $110.00.
Reference
Alaska's Glaciers, Special Reprint
by Bruce Molina. 1988. Alaska
Northwest Publishing Company,
Edmonds, WA 98020. 144 pp.
$19.95.
Handbook of Seafloor Heatflow by
James A. Wright and Keith E.
Louden. 1989. CRC Press, Boca
Raton, FL 33431. 710 pp. $165.00.
Poisonous and Venomous Marine
Animals of the World, Second
Revised Edition by Bruce W.
Halstead. 1988. The Darwin Press,
Princeton, NJ 08540. 288 pp. + L.
$250.00.
Practical Handbook of Marine
Science by Michael J. Kennish.
1989. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL
33431. 710 pp. $45.00.
Remote Sensing Yearbook 1988/89
edited by Arthur Cracknell and
Ladson Hayes. 1988. Taylor &
Francis, Philadelphia, PA 19106. 733
pp. + x. $154.00.
Taxonomy of Economic Seaweeds:
With Reference to Some Pacific
and Caribbean Species, Volume II
edited by Isabella Abbott. 1988.
California Sea Grant College
Program, La Jolla, CA 92093. 265
pp. + xvi. $10.00.
World Resources 1988-89: An
Assessment of the Resource Base
that Supports the Global Economy
edited by Mary E. Paden. 1988.
Basic Books, New York, NY 10022.
400 pp. + xii. $16.95.
Ships and Sailing
Celestial Navigation: What the
Ocean Yachtmaster Needs to
Know by Tom Cunliffe. 1989. TAB
Books, Blue Ridge Summit, PA
17294. 63 pp. $10.95.
The Cockpit Quiz Book: 26
Puzzlers to Amuse, Annoy and
Enlighten You & Your Shipmates
by C. Dale Nouse. 1989. Seven
Seas Press, Camden, ME 04843. 83
pp. $7.95.
Day Skipper: Pilotage and
Navigation by Pat Langley-Price
and Philip Ouvry. 1988. Sheridan
House, Dobbs Ferry, NY 10522.
126 pp. + xiv and chart. $23.95.
Design Your Own Yacht by Ben
Smith. 1988. Sheridan House,
Dobbs Ferry, NY 10522. 204 pp.
+ viii. $45.00.
Historic Shipwrecks: Issues in
Management edited by Joy
Waldron Murphy. 1988. Partners
for Livable Places, Washington, DC
20036. 59 pp. + 5 appendices.
$18.50.
The Practical Pilot: Coastal
Navigation by Eye, Intuition and
Common Sense by Leonard Eyges.
1989. International Marine
Publishing, Camden, ME 04843. 224
pp. + x. $19.95.
Upgrading Your Small Sailboat for
Cruising by Paul and Marya Butler.
1988. International Marine
Publishing Company, Camden, ME
04843. 211 pp. + xii. $19.95.
The Yachtsman's Weather Guide
by Ingrid Holford. 1988. Sheridan
House, Dobbs Ferry, NY 10522.
94 pp. $19.95.
Oceanus
The International Magazine
of Marine Science and Policy
Published by Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution
Foreign Subscription Order Form: Outside U.S. & Canada*
Please make ( heques payable to Cambridge University Press
D one year at £20.00
Library or Institution:
D one year at £37.00
D payment enclosed.
(we require prepayment)
Please send MY Subscription to:
Please send a GIFT Subscription to:
Name
(please print)
Name
(please print)
Street address
Street address
City
State
Zip
* U.S. and Canadian subscribers please use form inserted at
front of issue.
City
Donor's Name
Address^
State
Zip
6/89
• me i name Kevisitea,
Vol. 29:3, Fall 198ft- Radioactivity of the Irish Sea, ocean architecture, more.
• The Great Barrier Reef: Science & Management,
Vol. 29:2, Summer 1986— Describes the world's largest (oral reef system.
• The Arctic Ocean,
Vol. 29:1, Spring 198fa — An important issue on an active Irontier.
• The Oceans and National Security,
Vol. 28:2, Summer 1985 — The oceans from the viewpoint of the modern navy,
strategy, technology, weapons systems, and science.
Vol. 2b:4, Winter 148! 84 - U.S. -Chinese collaboration, tec tonics, aquae ulture,
and more.
• Offshore Oil and Gas,
Vol. 26:3, Fall 1983-History of techniques, environmental concerns,
and alternatives.
• General Issue,
Vol. 26:2, Summer 1983 — Bivalves as pollution indicators, Gulf Stream rings.
• General Issue,
Vol. 25:2, Summer 1982 — Coastal resource management, acoustic
tomography, aquaculture, radioactive waste.
Issues not listed here, including those published prior to 1977, are out of print.
They are available on microfilm through University Microfilm International,
300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106.
Back issues cost $4.00 each (Reprinted Caribbean Marine Science issue, Vol.
30:4, is $6.50). There is a discount of 25 percent on orders of five or more.
Orders must be prepaid; please make checks payable to Woods Hole Ocean-
ographic Institution. Foreign orders must be accompanied by a check payable
Send orders to:
Oceanus back issues
Subscriber Service Center
P.O. Box 6419
Ci/rar-iico MY 1T91 7
HAS THE SUBSCRIPTION COUPON BEEN DETACHED?
If someone else has
made use of the
coupon attached to
this card, you can still
subscribe. Just send a
cheque — £ 20 for
one year (four
issues)— to this
address:
Cambridge University Press
The Edinburgh Building
Shaftesbury Road
Cambridge CB2 2RU
England
Please make checks
payable to Woods
Hole Oceanographic
Institution
1930
rmmmmmmmmmmmmi
Cambridge
University Press
The Edinburgh
Building
Shaftesbury Road
Cambridge CB2 2RU
England
Album of Meteorological History,
Science, Legend, and Folklore by
Gary Lockhart. 1988. John Wiley &
Sons, New York, NY 10158. 230 pp.
$12.95.
Marine Policy
Deep Water: Development and
Change in Pacific Village Fisheries
by Margaret Critchlow Rodman.
1989. Westview Press, Boulder, CO
80301. 173 pp. $18.95.
Poisonous ana venomous
Animals of the World, Second
Revised Edition by Bruce W.
Halstead. 1988. The Darwin Press,
Princeton, NJ 08540. 288 pp. + L.
$250.00.
Practical Handbook of Marine
Science by Michael J. Kennish.
1989. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL
33431. 710 pp. $45.00.
Remote Sensing Yearbook 1988/89
edited by Arthur Cracknel! and
Ladson Hayes. 1988. Taylor &
Francis, Philadelphia, PA 19106. 733
pp. + x. $154.00.
Cruising by Paul and Marya Butier.
1988. International Marine
Publishing Company, Camden, ME
04843. 211 pp. + xii. $19.95.
The Yachtsman's Weather Guide
by Ingrid Holford. 1988. Sheridan
House, Dobbs Ferry, NY 10522.
94 pp. $19.95.
Ocear
Whither the Whales?
Vol. 32:1, Spring, 1989-
Perhaps the most complete
and in-depth summary of
cetacean research generally
available. Find out which
whales are really endan-
gered; how intelligent they
are; the latest research
methods, including satellite
tracking and photo-ID stud-
ies; the importance of
whaling to the Eskimos,
Japanese and Icelanders;
and what's known about
dolphin society.
DSVAlvin: 25 Years
of Discovery
Vol. 31:4, Winter 1988/89-
A 25th anniversary salute to
"the stubby little sub that
could," reviewing the de-
sign and history of ocean-
ography's first research
submersible. Covers its ex-
ploits from the hair-raising
search for a lost hydrogen
bomb in 1966, to its role in
deep-sea microbiology, and
the recent exciting discov-
ery of a low-level glow at
deep-sea hot vents.
Sea Grant Issue
Vol. 31:3, Fall 1988-Since
1966 the National Sea Grant
Program has been support-
ing coastal and marine ed-
ucation, research, and
advisory services. Articles
span the spectrum of Sea
Grant activities, which in-
clude rehabilitating the
world's largest freshwater
estuary, organizing citizen
volunteers for environmen-
tal monitoring, and the new
field of shellfish biotech-
nology.
Oceanus
THE ANTARCTIC
The Antarctic
Vol. 31:2, Summer 1988-
Claimed by several nations,
the frozen continent of Ant-
arctica presents a challenge
to international policy mak-
ers and scientists. Legal,
political, and scientific is-
sues are examined. Mineral
and living resources, the
global effects of Antarctic
climate, and the possible
impacts of Antarctic tour-
ism and pollution are as-
sessed by some leading
Antarctic researchers.
• U.S. Marine Sanctuaries,
Vol. il : 1, Spring 19K8 — Features all the operating, and various proposed, sites.
• Caribbean Marine Science,
Vol. 30:4, Winter 1987/88 — Biology, geology, resources, and human impacts.
• Columbus, Plastics, Sea-Level Rise, TBT,
Vol. 30:3, Fall 1987 -Chernobyl fallout in the Black Sea, and photosyntheiu
animals.
• Galapagos Marine Resources Reserve,
Vol. >0:2, Summer 1987 — Legal, management, scientific, and historical aspects.
• Japan and the Sea,
Vol. 30:1, Spring 1987 -Japanese ocean science, fishing, submersibles, space.
• The Titanic Revisited,
Vol. 29:3, Fall 1986 — Radioactivity of the Irish Sea, ocean architecture, more.
• The Great Barrier Reef: Science & Management,
Vol. 29:2, Summer 1986 — Describes the world's largest coral reef system.
• The Arctic Ocean,
Vol. 29:1, Spring 1986-An important issue on an active frontier.
• The Oceans and National Security,
Vol. 28:2, Summer 1985 -The oceans from the viewpoint of the modern navy,
strategy, technology, weapons systems, and science.
• Marine Archaeology,
\ . .1 18:1, spun.u 1 lit;5- History and science beneath the waves.
• The Exclusive Economic Zone,
Vol. 27:-), Winter 1984/85 -Options for the U.S. FEZ.
• Deep-Sea Hot Springs and Cold Seeps,
Vol. 2~: i. Fall 1984-A full report on vent science.
• El Nino,
Vol. 27:2, Summer 1984
• Industry and the Oceans,
Vol. 27:1, Spring 1984
• Oceanography in China,
Vol. 26:4, Winter 1983/84 - U.S. -Chinese collaboration, tectonics, aquaculture,
and more.
• Offshore Oil and Gas,
Vol. 26:3, Fall 1983 — History of techniques, environmental concerns,
and alternatives.
• General Issue,
Vol. 26:2, Summer 1983 -Bivalves as pollution indicators, Gulf Stream rings.
• General Issue,
Vol. 25:2, Summer 1982-1 o.istal resource management, acoustic
tomography, aquaculture, radioactive waste.
Special Titanic Reprint
Includes all O< eanus material
from 1985 and 1986 expeditions.
$9.00
Issues not listed here, including those published prior to 1977, are out of print.
They are available on microfilm through University Microfilm International,
300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106.
Back issues cost $4.00 each (Reprinted Caribbean Marine Science issue, Vol.
id: l. is $6.50). There is a discount of 25 percent on orders of five or more.
Orders must be prepaid; please make checks payable to Woods Hole Ocean-
ographic Institution. Foreign orders must be accompanied by a check payable
to Oceanus for £5.00 per issue (or equivalent).
Send orders to:
Oceanus back issues
Subscriber Service Center
P.O. Box 6419
Syracuse, NY 13217
Thoughts about globalclimate change from this issue
*
V
s
"Sea levels have only gone up several inches over the last century, but their rise is
sure to accelerate in the coming decades as global warming sets in motion an
expansion of ocean volume and a melting of mountain glaciers and polar icecaps."
— Jodi Jacobson, Worldwatch Institute
, .
". . .from an objective point of view, there's no compelling evidence of an enhanced
greenhouse warming."
—Andrew Solow & James Broadus,
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
"At the moment, the models are relatively crude. They can predict whether or not
El Nino will occur, but cannot predict how it will evolve or what strength it will
attain.
—Ants Leetmaa, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration