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Currently nearly 90% of the heat generated by human-caused climate change is being absorbed by the ocean. But the long-term ability of the ocean to store heat is uncertain. Here I look at a time period three million years ago that is often used as an analog for future climate change because atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are similar to today. Using past climate reconstructions from marine sediment we find the upper ocean temperature and heat content was high three million years ago relative to today. However, few of the climate models used to simulate climate in the past (and the future) are able to match the past climate reconstructions. The climate models that best match the past climate reconstructions have enhanced polar amplification.

Dr. Heather Ford

Reader in Paleoceanography at Queen Mary University of London

Dr. Heather Ford received her Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she studied paleoceanography of the tropical Pacific. During her postdoctoral position at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in New York, she researched deep ocean circulation during the mid-Pleistocene Transition. She then moved to University of Cambridge as a Natural Environment Research Council Independent Research Fellow focusing on deep ocean circulation during the warm Pliocene. At Queen Mary University of London, she continues to explore the surface to deep ocean conditions of the last few million years. She’s excited to join MLML during her sabbatical as a visiting scientist.