Jump in Lake Temperatures Measured Worldwide

According to their publication, they vigorously studied 235 lakes taking more than 25 years’ time. “In contrast, satellite images only work if the lake is very big, but they can also gauge temperatures in remote and inaccessible places”.

Increased evaporation will cause a drop in lake water levels. “I’m not suggesting that we won’t see ice on Lake Superior again, but we are going to see more years like 2012 when we had no ice”. Those blooms rob lakes of oxygen and some can be toxic to fish, animals and even humans. This is also the considered the largest study of this kind, where all the lakes involved in this study provide more than 50 percent of the planet’s freshwater resources.

The NASA and National Science Foundation-funded study is clear that the trend presents serious environmental threats to the environment.

Professor Hamilton and Dr Mat Allan from the University of Waikato, along with Piet Verburg from NIWA, contributed data from New Zealand’s lakes to the database, which included information on individual lakes’ climate and geographical features – factors which can influence the temperature of a lake over time. More algal blooms will consume more oxygen and water and can even be toxic to some wildlife.

“Our climate is changing because humans are adding large amounts of heat-trapping gases to the atmosphere”, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), a non-profit science advocacy organization, said in a recent report on climate change solutions.

Press releases from Washington State University and York University describing the details of the study can be found here and here.

Climate change is rapidly warming lakes around the world, threatening freshwater supplies and ecosystems, new data has revealed.

The findings of the current study were detailed in the journal of Geophysical Research Letters. 61 degrees Fahrenheit. Lake Tahoe (+.97 F), Lake Washington from Seattle (+.49 F), the Dead Sea (+1.13 F) and Superior (+2.09 F) were just some of the lakes that researchers have enumerated to prove that water temperatures are rising all over the globe. While that might not seem too significant, it’s a higher rate of warming than witnessed in either the atmosphere or the ocean, and the long-term effects could be pronounced.

Such rapid swings can affect aquatic ecosystems in profound ways, raising concerns about the quality of waters that people rely on for drinking supplies, crop irrigation and energy production. “Protein from freshwater fish is especially important in the developing world”, affirmed Hampton.

Temperatures in both regions are rising faster than the average. But they only measure surface temperature, while hand measurements can detect changes in temperature throughout a lake. Also, while satellite measurements go back 30 years, some lake measurements go back more than a century.

“Combining the ground and satellite measurements provides the most comprehensive view of how lake temperatures are changing around the world”, he said. The Great Lakes and others in northern climates are losing winter ice earlier, and some areas are getting less cloud cover, exposing their surfaces to more sunlight. The scientists compiled measurements from the bottom of the lakes, satellite data, and others.