Man‐induced salinity and temperature increases in western Mediterranean deep water

Abstract

The historical data base is used to study property changes in both the Western Mediterranean Deep Water (WMDW) and the Levantine Intermediate Water (LIW). Changes in WMDW properties during the past century have been described previously, although on a more limited data base. We are not aware of any previous study of changes in LIW properties. In the extensive data base we used, increases appear in both WMDW temperature and salinity, from 1909 to the present, which substantiate previously reported observations. In addition, we find that the density of WMDW seems to have increased as well, which disagrees with previous suggestions that it has remained constant. We observe that the WMDW temperature increase displays a distinct acceleration starting about 1955 and that a similar, although less conspicuous, acceleration occurs in the WMDW salinity increase. From our study of historical data on LIW properties, the LIW salinity also appears to have increased since 1909. We argue that the warming trend in WMDW may well be a response to the salinity increase, which seems to be imported from the eastern Mediterranean by LIW, and as such our observations endorse a recently published hypothesis. The increase in LIW salinity, in turn, is attributed to changes in the eastern Mediterranean freshwater budget, resulting from damming of major rivers that drain either directly or indirectly into the eastern Mediterranean. Finally, we demonstrate that the basin has not yet reached a new steady state after this freshwater disturbance and that the response time of the system seems to be of the order of 100 years.