Get the facts on substance abuse.īradford Health Services. Definition of addiction.Īmerican Addiction Centers. Melting Arctic sea ice is weakening this current, meaning the UK could face more extreme weather as a result of climate change.American Society of Addiction Medicine. Melting sea ice and rising temperatures can disrupt these currents, not only affecting wildlife that depends on them but also, potentially, local climates.įor example, the UK is comparatively mild because of the heat brought by an ocean current from the Gulf of Mexico. Saltiness and temperature are the drivers of ocean currents that move heat and nutrients around the world. When sea ice melts, it doesn't add volume to the ocean, but it does add freshwater, locally decreasing the saltiness of the sea. This increases sea levels globally, which can inundate low-lying land and important coastal environments such as mangrove forests and wetlands. When ice on land - ice sheets and glaciers - melts, it adds water volume to the ocean. This includes coral exoskeletons - a further reason coral reefs are under threat worldwide. This can have a knock-on impact on human communities that rely on those fish for food.Īcidification can weaken sea animals' shells and external skeletons.

Warming ocean temperatures can lead to coral bleaching - the sudden die-off of large parts of coral reefs - as well as cause animals such as fish to seek cooler waters, shifting their habitats north. Greater concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere also mean that more of it dissolves in the ocean, leading to acidification.Įach of these changes affect marine wildlife.

The melting of ice both on land and in the sea also affects the ocean, causing more sea-level rise and reducing the salinity of the ocean, respectively. Climate change warms the ocean, causing knock-on effects such as thermal expansion - which leads to a rise in sea level - and changes in ocean currents.

On effects