The First Law of Thermodynamics in a salty ocean

Abstract

The First Law of Thermodynamics is developed from fundamentals for open, non-equilibrium systems of seawater in motion, exchanging salt and freshwater internally and with their surroundings, and varying continuously in temperature, pressure, and salinity. The aim is clarity and consistency of concepts – and precision in the accompanying vocabulary. Particular attention is given to the way in which salinity variation plays out in the logical structures. The arbitrary constants in the thermodynamic potentials and the various First Law equations are highlighted, in order to remove them, and to recover the physically meaningful content. When this is done, it is seen that salinity variations have little consequence in application of the First Law to the ocean, apart from affecting values of coefficients.