Therefore, the deep ocean (below about 200 meters depth) is cold, with an average temperature of only 4°C (39°F). Cold water is also more dense, and as a result heavier, than warm water. Colder water sinks below the warm water at the surface, which contributes to the coldness of the deep ocean.
The temperature of the ocean determines what form the water takes. Most of the ocean is liquid water, but if it gets cold enough, it turns to solid ice, or if it gets hot enough, it can pass into the atmosphere as water vapour This image clearly shows warmer surface water near the equator and cooler surface water near the poles.
d) Water retains its heat longer than land, so the air above the oceans is warmer than the air above the land during the evening. a) The land loses its heat more quickly than water, resulting in relatively cooler air temperatures above the land during the evening.
Cold water is also more dense, and as a result heavier, than warm water. Colder water sinks below the warm water at the surface, which contributes to the coldness of the deep ocean.
These variations in solar energy mean that the ocean surface can vary in temperature from a warm 30°C (86°F) in the tropics to a very cold -2°C (28°F) near the poles.
In the ocean, solar energy is reflected in the upper surface or rapidly absorbed with depth, meaning that the deeper into the ocean you descend, the less sunlight there is. This results in less warming of the water.
Virgin Islands expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer, we dove to a depth of 5,000 meters (16,405 feet) on Mona Seamount, where the average ocean water temperature was 2.2°C (36°F).
Therefore, the deep ocean (below about 200 meters depth) is cold, with an average temperature of only 4°C (39°F). Cold water is also more dense, and as a result heavier, than warm water. Colder water sinks below the warm water at the surface, which contributes to the coldness of the deep ocean.
7. Another factor in how water and land respond to changes in insolation and air temperatures is how deeply heat is able to enter each material. Nearly all water allows at least some transmission, so shortwave radiation can penetrate to depths of tens of meters or more. In contrast, rocks and soil are largely opaque, so insolation is confined to the surface, and heat must move downward into the land by conduction, which it does by only a meter or two during the day.
For the same energy loss, land cools more than does water. Also, the land became hotter during the day, and hot objects radiate more energy than cool ones, so the land loses energy faster than the water. As a result, land cools off much faster than water at night.
Insolation that strikes water is transformed into one of three different fluxes of energy. Some energy goes into heating the water (ground heat), some heats the air (sensible heat in the atmosphere), but a large amount goes into latent heat produced by evaporation. In contrast, insolation striking land goes almost entirely into sensible heat in ...
A physical attribute called heat capacity expresses how much heat is required to change a volume's temperature by one Kelvin.
Under calm ocean conditions (left column), limited mixing causes surface waters warmed by the Sun to remain near the surface, so there is a strong temperature contrast with depth.
Mixing allows heat to be carried deeper into the water column (much faster than heat is conducted) and brings up cooler water that gives off energy to the atmosphere more slowly (because it is cool). As a result, mixed water heats up more slowly than does land, which experiences almost no vertical mixing.
4. The specific heat of water is four times that of most rocks and materials. This means that it takes four times more energy to heat water than it takes to heat an equivalent mass of rock.
The variation in solar energy absorbed means that the ocean surface can vary in temperature from a warm 30°C in the tropics to a very cold -2°C near the poles. The temperature of the ocean also varies from top to bottom, giving a vertical structure to most of the ocean.
Also called solar power. thermocline: A layer of water that has a large variation in temperature from top to bottom. In the ocean, it often separates surface waters from deep waters, both of which have similar temperatures throughout. gases: The state of matter distinguished from the solid and liquid states.
Water warms up more slowly than air but can hold more heat. 3. – water needs 4 times as much energy to raise its temperature by 1ºC as the same mass. 4. of air does – so the ocean plays an important part in taking up energy from the Sun and stopping the Earth getting too hot.