全球變暖使海洋吸收的熱量有多驚人？好比每秒發生一次原子彈爆炸

Global warming of oceans equivalent to an atomic bomb per second

全球變暖使海洋吸收的熱量相當於每秒發生一次原子彈爆炸

素材來源：《衛報》 翻譯：世界播

Global warming has heated the oceans by the equivalent of one atomic bomb explosion per second for the past 150 years, according to analysis of new research.

一項最新研究分析顯示，過去150年來全球變暖使海洋吸收的熱量相當於每秒發生一次原子彈爆炸。

More than 90% of the heat trapped by humanity』s greenhouse gas emissions has been absorbed by the seas, with just a few per cent heating the air, land and ice caps respectively. The vast amount of energy being added to the oceans drives sea-level rise and enables hurricanes and typhoons to become more intense.

人類排放的溫室氣體中，90%以上的熱量被海洋吸收，只有百分之幾的熱量分別為空氣、陸地和冰蓋加熱。向海洋中注入的大量能量推動海平面上升，並使颶風和颱風變得更加猛烈。

Much of the heat has been stored in the ocean depths but measurements here only began in recent decades and existing estimates of the total heat the oceans have absorbed stretch back only to about 1950. The new work extends that back to 1871. Scientists have said that understanding past changes in ocean heat was critical for predicting the future impact of climate change.

大部分的熱量儲存在海洋深處，但這裡的測量是最近幾十年才開始的，而對海洋吸收的總熱量的現有估計只能追溯到1950年左右。這項新研究可以追溯到1871年。科學家們說，了解過去海洋熱量的變化對於預測未來氣候變化的影響至關重要。

A Guardian calculation found the average heating across that 150-year period was equivalent to about 1.5 Hiroshima-size atomic bombs per second. But the heating has accelerated over that time as carbon emissions have risen, and was now the equivalent of between three and six atomic bombs per second.

《衛報》的一項計算髮現，這150年期間的平均升溫相當於每秒1.5顆廣島大小的原子彈發生爆炸。但隨著碳排放的增加，升溫速度也在加快，現在相當於每秒3到6顆原子彈。

「I try not to make this type of calculation, simply because I find it worrisome,」 said Prof Laure Zanna, at the University of Oxford, who led the new research. 「We usually try to compare the heating to [human] energy use, to make it less scary.」

領導這項新研究的牛津大學教授洛爾?贊納表示：「我盡量不做這種計算，只是因為我覺得它令人擔憂。我們通常試圖將升溫與(人類的)能源使用進行比較，以降低它的可怕程度。」

She added: 「But obviously, we are putting a lot of excess energy into the climate system and a lot of that ends up in the ocean,. There is no doubt.」 The total heat taken up by the oceans over the past 150 years was about 1,000 times the annual energy use of the entire global population.

她補充稱:「但很明顯，我們正在向氣候系統中投入大量過剩的能源，其中很多最終進入了海洋。這是毫無疑問的。在過去的150年里，海洋吸收的總熱量大約是全球人口每年能源消耗的1000倍。」

The research has been published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and combined measurements of the surface temperature of the ocean since 1871 with computer models of ocean circulation.

這項研究發表在《美國國家科學院院刊》上，並將1871年以來海洋表面溫度的測量數據與海洋環流的計算機模型結合起來。

Prof Samar Khatiwala, also at the University of Oxford and part of the team, said: 「Our approach is akin to 『painting』 different bits of the ocean surface with dyes of different colours and monitoring how they spread into the interior over time. If we know what the sea surface temperature anomaly was in 1871 in the North Atlantic Ocean we can figure out how much it contributes to the warming in, say, the deep Indian Ocean in 2018.」

同為牛津大學教授、也是該研究小組成員的薩馬爾?卡蒂瓦拉教授表示:「我們的方法類似於用不同顏色的染料『繪製』海洋表面的不同部分，並監測它們是如何隨著時間的推移擴散到海洋內部的。如果我們知道1871年北大西洋的海表溫度異常是什麼，我們就能夠推算出它對2018年印度洋深處的溫度變暖產生了多大的貢獻。」

Rising sea level has been among the most dangerous long-term impacts of climate change, threatening billions of people living in coastal cities, and estimating future rises is vital in preparing defences. Some of the rise comes from the melting of land-bound ice in Greenland and elsewhere, but another major factor has been the physical expansion of water as it gets warmer.

海平面上升一直是氣候變化最危險的長期影響之一，威脅著沿海城市的數十億居民，估計未來海平面上升對防禦工作至關重要。海平面上升的部分原因是格陵蘭島和其他地方陸地冰的融化，但另一個主要因素是隨著海洋變暖，從而導致了水的物理膨脹。

However, the seas do not warm uniformly as ocean currents transport heat around the world. Reconstructing the amount of heat absorbed by the oceans over the past 150 years is important as it provides a baseline. In the Atlantic, for example, the team found that half the rise seen since 1971 at low and middle latitudes resulted from heat transported into the region by currents.

然而，由於洋流將熱量輸送到世界各地，海洋並不是均勻變暖的。重建過去150年海洋吸收的熱量很重要，因為它提供了一個基線。例如，在大西洋，研究小組發現，自1971年以來，低緯度和中緯度地區氣溫上升了一半，原因是洋流將熱量輸送到該地區。

The new work would help researchers make better predictions of sea-level rise for different regions in the future. 「Future changes in ocean transport could have severe consequences for regional sea-level rise and the risk of coastal flooding,」 the researchers said. 「Understanding ocean heat change and the role of circulation in shaping the patterns of warming remain key to predicting global and regional climate change and sea-level rise.」

這項新研究將幫助研究人員更好地預測未來不同地區的海平面上升情況。研究人員表示:「未來海洋運輸的變化可能會對區域海平面上升和沿海洪災的風險造成嚴重後果。了解海洋熱變化和環流在氣候變暖模式形成中的作用，仍然是預測全球和地區氣候變化和海平面上升的關鍵。」

Dana Nuccitelli, an environmental scientist who was not involved in the new research, said: 「The ocean heating rate has increased as global warming has accelerated, and the value is somewhere between roughly three to six Hiroshima bombs per second in recent decades, depending on which dataset and which timeframe is used. This new study estimates the ocean heating rate at about three Hiroshima bombs per second for the period of 1990 to 2015, which is on the low end of other estimates.」

未參與這項新研究的環境科學家達納?努奇切利表示：「隨著全球變暖的加劇，海洋升溫速度加快，近幾十年來的數值大約在每秒三到六枚廣島炸彈爆炸速率之間，這取決於使用的數據集和時間範圍。這項新的研究估計，在1990年至2015年期間，海洋加熱速率約為每秒三枚廣島炸彈發生爆炸，這是其他估計數字中的最小值」

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