The Layered Approach To Big Water - 7

Layer Eight

I. Background

Regular readers know that I use only in situ measurements from the World Ocean Database (WOD) that have been placed into the "CTD" and "PFL" datasets, and that I use both 'O' (random depth) and 'S' (standard depth) categories therein.

Recently I mentioned changing my conversion settings to only use individual measurements in the WOD that have been given a zero errors setting (out of 0-9) by the WOD handlers (A New Way of Analyzing The Depths - 4).

Layer Seven

Subsequent to that change, I have now also added filters that only allow individual measurements of the Temperature ('varcode 1') and Salinity ('varcode 2') measurements.

Further, I have put quality restrictions of my own on the qualities of those measurements.

Layer Six

This involves only using Salinity readings from 0.5 to 38, and Temperature readings from -2.5 C to 35.5 C, since those are the general low (polar) and high (Persion Gulf) valid ocean water temperatures (Temperature of Ocean Water).

Layer Five

Some of the values in the WOD are out of that range, so they are flagged and filtered now so that I don't use them.

Layer Four

Nevertheless, over so many posts, a few may still get through the software system, so keep an eye out as I do.

Layer Three

II. The "Layer" Approach

In this series I have intended to follow latitude oriented layers from the Equator north into the Northern Hemisphere, and south into the Southern Hemisphere (see last graph showing the area in red outline).

Layer Two

The intent is to graph areas of generally equal temperature and salinity ranges, seeing as how the layers tend to be equidistant from the Equator and from the poles.

Layer One

Today's posts feature Layer Zero through Layer Eight, which covers the Northern Hemisphere.

The day of year format "DOY" is used on all graphs.

Layer Zero

This format tends to show a generally decreasing temperature levels as we move from the Equator toward the Arctic, which is to be expected.

III. Other Formats To Come

The month and year formats for these zones will be presented in graphs in soon-to-come posts.

They will be covering the same nine layers.

They will be  in formats that use the exact same temperature and salinity data.

Nevertheless, they will be able to present a different, but revealing picture.

I have been pleased with how much it helps to present the exact same data in three ways as I said before.

IV. Why Am I Doing This?

I have written that one of the reasons is to revisit the hypothesis that "thermal expansion is the main cause of sea level rise" in the 19th and 20th centuries.

World Ocean Database Zones (layers L0-L8)

That came from the IPCC some time back, and IMO it is not a correct hypothesis, because, as you can see the temperature levels of the oceans do not show the trend that sea level graphs show.

The bathtub model as it applies to sea level change is a non-starter (The Bathtub Model Doesn't Hold Water, 2, 3, 4).

The ocean layers, if the thermal expansion hypothesis had not been falsified in these multiple series of posts (Series Posts, SEA LEVEL), would show stable upward trend lines.

Instead, they show stable trend lines indicating IMO that the ninety some odd percent of heat being trapped by green house gases is going into the oceans and is then being relatively evenly distributed.

V. Exceptions To The Rule

The polar regions are out of form in that department, because they are unequally impacted (see e.g. Polar Sea Ice Trend At Both Poles, 2, 3, 4).

They are warming several times faster than the lower latitudes are (Live Science).

The graphs get a bit rugged at the poles (compare Layer Zero  to Layer Eight).

VI. Conclusion

The great ice sheets contain sufficient ice to raise sea level hundreds of feet, and they are now and have been the main source of sea level change (Humble Oil-Qaeda).

The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.