Iowa Climate Science Education
Water (H2O) has magical properties that make our planet suitable for us. The video explains why most of the ocean water is about 4 degrees Celsius. A transcript from another presentation draws the implications. Excerpts in italics with my bolds.
At the surface, ocean water can vary wildly in temperature – the water at the equator is around 30 degrees Celsius and the water at the poles is, well, freezing. But surface waters are only a small fraction of the total water in the ocean. Dive a little deeper, and you’ll find that a whopping 75 percent of the ocean’s water is all at the same temperature…and we’re not talking averages or anything – the vast majority of ocean water is 4 degrees Celsius. And that’s not just a coincidence – it’s because water is weird.
As a liquid cools, its molecules slow down and the liquid generally gets denser and denser. That’s how molten…
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