Climate mediated changes in seawater chemistry and their potential effects on marine lightning intensity

Abstract

In 2016, the World Meteorological Organization declared that lightning is an essential climate variable. To date, global change studies have only considered the effect of warming on lightning flash frequency and the global distribution of lightning activity. Furthermore, none of these studies considered the effects of climate change on lightning flash intensity. In our previous studies we suggested based on laboratory experiments that lightning intensity over water surfaces may be influenced by their chemical properties, including salinity (S), pH and total alkalinity (TA). In this study we tested the combined effects of changes in S, TA and pH in Mediterranean Sea surface water on the intensity of laboratory generated electrical sparks, which are considered to be analogous to cloud to sea-surface intensity of lightning discharges. The range of values tested in the lab correspond to changes in S, pH and TA of Mediterranean surface water that were caused by the anthropogenic climate change, ocean acidification and damming of the Nile in the 1960s. Where, the damming of the Nile is generally accepted to have caused nearly 30% of the total salination of Mediterranean surface water until now. The experimental results were used to develop a multivariate linear model of Lightning Flash Intensity (LFI) as a function of S, TA/S, which  and pH. The model was validated with wintertime (DJF) LFI measurements along a Mediterranean Sea zonal profile during the period 2009-2020 compared to corresponding climate model outputs of S, TA and pH. Based on this model, the combined effects of climate change, ocean acidification and the damming of the Nile, may have increased LFI in the Levantine Sea by 16±14% until now relative to the pre-Aswan Dam period. Furthermore, assuming that salinization and acidification of the Levantine Sea will continue at current trends, the LFI is predicted to increase by 25±13% by the year 2050.