Conservation Geography

Dr. Ankur Awadhiya, IFS

Indian Forest Service
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Module - 5
Hydrosphere
Lecture - 13
Structure and composition

Namaste! Today we begin a new module, which is Hydrosphere.

(Refer Slide Time: 00:18)

This module will have three lectures Structure and Composition, Oceans and Water
movement and Hydrological cycle. So, let us begin with the first lecture.

(Refer Slide Time: 00:30)

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Structure and composition. Now, we have observed before that hydrosphere is one of the four
spheres of Earth.

(Refer Slide Time: 00:43)

So, we had talked about the first sphere being the Lithosphere, litho means rocks, so, this is
the rocky sphere or the solid portion of the Earth. Then we talked about atmosphere where
atmos refers to gases, so, this is the gaseous sphere or the envelope of air that surrounds the
planet. Now, we are talking about the hydrosphere; hydro means water. So, this is the watery
sphere, all the water that is contained in this planet. And the fourth sphere is the biosphere
which is the livings sphere.

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So, hydrosphere the term comes from the Greek terms hydro meaning water and is sphaira
meaning a sphere. So, this is the watery sphere, we can define it as the combined mass of
water found on under and above the surface of a planet on, under and above. So, what are the
waters that we are talking about? When we talk about water on the surface of a planet, we are
talking about things such as oceans, seas, rivers, rivulets, channels, streams, lakes, ponds,
marshes, and so on.

So, all the water that is there on the surface of the planet, but hydrosphere also includes water
that is under the surface of the planet, meaning that we are talking about groundwater and it
also includes the water that is above the surface of the planet, meaning that we are talking
about water that is present in the form of water vapor in the atmosphere. So, that too be
include as part of the hydrosphere. So, hydrosphere is the combined mass of water found on,
under and above the surface of a planet.

(Refer Slide Time: 02:48)

Now, on the Earth, the distribution of the water is like this 97.25 percent of all water is there
in the oceans. So, oceans are the biggest component of the hydrosphere. Around 97.25
percent of all the water. Around 2 percent is in the form of ice and snow, especially the ice
and snow in the glaciers and ice and snow in the permafrost regions, those regions that are
covered with snow and ice all around the year typically near the poles.

So, that comprises around 2 percent of all the water. 0.68 percent of water is groundwater.
So, this is the third major component. And then we have everything else, lakes 0.01 percent,
soil moisture 0.005 percent, atmosphere 0.001 percent, rivers and streams 0.0001 percent and

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biological water that is water that is present in the living beings, the plants and animals. So
that is 0.00004 percent.

And all of this water is moving at all times, it moves with the hydrological cycle or the water
cycle. So water cycle is a cycle that moves water between all of these different components
of the hydrosphere.

(Refer Slide Time: 04:23)

And how does this water move, there are several processes. In the case of oceans, the water
can leave the oceans through evaporation. So in the process of evaporation because of heat,
water gets converted into water vapor and it moves into the atmosphere. From the ice and
snow components we can have snow melt, so in which case the ice and snow are converting
into liquid water or we can have sublimation where the ice and snow are converting directly
into a gas which is the water vapor.

From the groundwater, water can reach to the surface through groundwater discharged
springs, the surface runoff or the water that is there on the surface, it can move in the form of
a stream flow or it can get into the groundwater through storage infiltration. So, with the
steam flow, this surface runoff will move into the oceans and through story infiltration, this
water will move into the groundwater.

In the case of atmosphere, the primary processes are condensation and precipitation. So,
when water vapor condenses, it forms liquid water, which then falls down to the Earth
through the process of precipitation. Now, these are the major processes, there are a number
of other processes in each of these components. So, for instance, the surface runoff can also

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get evaporated but that is a very small fraction when we talk about the surface runoff. In the
case of the ocean water, some part of it may seep into the groundwater but that, again is a
small component. So, these are the major processes that move the water.

(Refer Slide Time: 06:07)

Now, we have observed that oceans formed the largest component of the hydrosphere.
Around 70 percent of the Earth's surface is covered with oceans. So, when we talk about
hydrosphere, it makes sense to give the lion's chunk or the lion's share of our attention to the
water in the oceans. So this is what we are going to do now.

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There are five oceans on the planet, we have the Arctic Ocean, the Antarctic ocean, or the
Southern Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean. So near the North Pole,
this region has the Arctic Ocean, this region has the Antarctic Ocean or the Southern Ocean.
Near India, we have the Indian Ocean. Here we have the Atlantic Ocean, and this portion is
the Pacific Ocean.

Now in this context, it is important to remember that there are nothing or no sharp boundaries
that define where an ocean begins or ends. So these are just artificial differences or
distinctions that we are making. So there is no line that separates the Indian Ocean from
Atlantic Ocean, or the Atlantic Ocean from the Pacific Ocean, the waters are continuous.

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And when we talk about the oceans, we need to also talk about the ocean floor. Now what is
below the surface of the oceans? It is not just a flatland, there are a number of features. And
these features play a role in the movement of waters. So we have things like the Continental
shelf, the Continental slope, the Abyssal plains, the Abyssal hills, Seamounts, Ocean
trenches, Volcanic islands, and a number of other features.

(Refer Slide Time: 07:56)

And of these features, we divide them into two categories. We have the major features and
the minor features. The major features include continental shelf, continental slope, abyssal
plain, and oceanic deeps or trenches. So let us now look at all of these.

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Continental shelf is the extended margin of the continents. So when we talk about an ocean,
the ocean is right next to a landmass which is the continent. Now the extension of the
continent below the water of the oceans is the continental shelf. It is the extended margin of
the continents occupied by relatively shallow seas and gulfs.

So its depth is not very high. It has a low gradient which means that it has a low slope less
than one degrees. It joins the continental slope along the shelf break. So, if this is the shelf,
this is the slope, this portion will be known as the shelf break. The width varies, but on an
average it is around 80 kilometers.

So this is a portion of the continent that goes below the surface of the oceans up to around 80
kilometers. The depth varies from 30 meters to around 600 meters. The waters get nutrients
from upwelling and runoff. Now in this portion, here in the continental shelf, you have water
at a, of a less depth and also you get quite a lot of nutrients. And we get nutrients through two
means.

One is runoff, which means that the rivers that are draining into the ocean, they are carrying
sediments and they are carrying nutrients. So that nutrient is made available for the organisms
that are living in the continental shelf. At the same time, we also have the process of
upwelling. So, what is upwelling?

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(Refer Slide Time: 10:02)

When we talk about a mass of water and when you have a moment of winds, so, you have
strong winds that are moving like this. So, what this wind would do is that it would take away
the top portion of this water and it would concentrate it on this side. So, essentially, you are
having more water that is deposited is that is getting deposited here and water from this
portion it is moving away. Now, when that happens, the water from the below it can rise
upwards.

So, you can have a cyclical moment of water like this. So, wind is shifting the water from this
point to this point, and then because you have an excess of water here the water column
increases in height, because of which it exerts a pressure and now the water moves down and
this cyclical in the cyclical manner the water can move. So, at these locations, you have water
that is coming up from below. So these are the regions that are known as upwelling regions.

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Similarly, we can also have a situation in which when we have this situation, and you have
the continental shelf, followed by the continental slope, if there is an ocean current that is
moving like this. So the waters in the current they will move along with this slope, reach into
the shelf, and here again you are getting water from the below. Now typically what happens
in an oceanic system is that when organisms die, they start to sink.

So when organisms die, the major chunks will be eaten up by sort by certain other organisms.
But whatever remains in the form of decomposed or partly decomposed fragments, it will go
on settling down. So typically, the water that is deep down in the oceans, it is having a larger
amount of nutrients than the water that is there on the top. Now through the process of
upwelling, this nutrient rich water is made available to the top layers of the ocean.

Now the problem with the bottom layers is that the oceans are so deep, that sunlight does not
reach to the bottom of the oceans. And so even though you have nutrients, you will not have a
large amount of photosynthetic activity, there is hardly any light available there. And so all of
that nutrient rich water is stored. Whereas on the top layers, you have a lot of sunlight, but
you do not have the nutrients or the minerals that are necessary for the growth of plants and
planktons.

So through the process of upwelling, what happens is that the nutrient rich water from deep
down, it comes to the surface and there, the plants and the planktons can make use of the
nutrients and they also have sufficient sunlight. So they will do photosynthesis and convert it
into food for all the organisms in the ocean.

So the ocean, the continental shelf, it gets nutrients from upwelling and runoff. And it is often
extremely productive, because light is available since the depth is less and nutrients are also
made available through upwelling and runoff. So when it is extremely productive, it means
that there is lot of photosynthetic activity, lot of food gets made. And because you have a lot
of food, it will also support a lot of organisms. So a very large number of fishes and other
aquatic organisms can be found in the continental shelves.

The continental shelf is covered with a variable thickness of sediments. Now these sediments
are being brought through the runoff process. So when the rivers are draining into the ocean,
they are bringing the sediments with them. Now these sediments are going to settle in the
continental shelf. Now, along with the sediments that the rivers are bringing, you also have
the organisms that are living there when they die, their bodies also are settling down in partly
decomposed or decomposed fashions, and so you are getting a lot of sediments.

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And these sediments settle down and you get a layer of variable thickness. So in certain areas,
especially those that are near the mouth of rivers, you have a very thick layer of sediments. In
far off areas you have a thinner layer of sediments. Now, because you are having sediments
here, so these are very good locations where sedimentary rocks can be formed.

And because you have ample amount of organisms here and the rivers are also bringing in
dead bodies of several organisms, so you also get a lot of fossils in these areas. So, these are
the areas where sedimentary rocks and fossils can be formed. And over time you can even
have good deposits of fossil fuels. So, this is the continental shelf.

(Refer Slide Time: 15:28)

It is followed by the continental slope. The continental slope is the region that joins the
continental shelf with the ocean basin or the abyssal plain. What we are saying is on one side

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you will be having continental shelf on the other side you will be having an abyssal plain. So
the region that is joining this is the continental slope. And as you can observe from this
figure, it is called as continental slope because its slope is very high. It is not like the
continental shelf.

When we say shelf, it means that it is more or less a level poor land. So less than one degree
of slope. But in the case of continental slope, the slopes are very high, the gradient is high
between 2 to 5 degrees. The depth varies from 200 meters to up to 3 kilometers. The slope
boundary is an indicator of the end of the continents. So, when we talk about this point, this is
where we can say that the continent is ending.

The canyons and the trenches may be observed along the slope boundaries. So you can have
certain geomorphological features such as canyons and trenches. We will have a look at it in
a short while. So, that is the continental slope.

(Refer Slide Time: 16:50)

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Next we have the Abyssal plain. It is a plain because it is a gently sloping area. So these are
gently sloping plains and they are abyssal which means they are at a depth. The depth varies
from 3 to 6 kilometers covered with clay and silt. So what are these plains covered off, they
are covered with clay and silt that is settling in these areas. Now remember that when the
sediments are brought by the rivers into the oceans, the larger size sediments they will be
deposited in the continental shelf.

And the more finer sediments will be taken away to larger distances, because they take a lot
of time to settle down. Which is why in the case of the abyssal plains, you will mostly find
clay and silt that are small in size and so they remain suspended for long. They cover roughly
70 percent of the sea floor. And so they are the largest habitats on the Earth. Because the
oceans themselves cover around 70 percent of the planet and they are covering 70 percent of
the 70 percent.

So, roughly around 49 percent of the Earth is comprised of abyssal planes. So, these are the
largest habitats that are found on the planet. Now, due to their depth, sunlight does not
penetrate leading to darkness and so the productivity is less. So, they are very much like
deserts in the ocean. So, you have nutrients, but you do not have a large number of organisms
that live in these areas. So, these are vast expanses with little, little amount of life very similar
to our deserts. So that is the abyssal plain.

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(Refer Slide Time: 18:37)

Next we have Oceanic deeps and trenches. These are relatively steep sided, narrow, deep
basins. They are steep sided, so this is a trench. So these are steep sided, these are very deep
and these are typically also narrow. So, if we look here, so the width here is less, the depth is
very high. So this is a very narrow trench.

The depths are 3 to 5 kilometers greater than the surrounding ocean floor. And Mariana
trench is the deepest place in the ocean. These are often associated with earthquakes and
volcanic activity. So these trenches are often formed because there is certain tectonic
movement that is going on in the area. So these are the oceanic trenches.

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(Refer Slide Time: 19:31)

We also have a number of minor features of which mid oceanic ridges, seamounts, submarine
canyons, guyots and atolls are more important.

(Refer Slide Time: 19:44)

Now we have already looked at mid oceanic ridges before so they are the chains of mountains
that are separated by a large depression, such as the Mid Atlantic ridge. So it is a chain of
mountains. And these are the largest mountain ranges on the planet running for roughly
65,000 kilometers. The mountain ranges can have peaks as high as 2.5 kilometers and may
reach above the surface of the ocean. For example, Iceland is a part of the mountain ridges.

And the ridges are often found along with divergent plate boundaries. We have observed this
before, when we were talking about plate tectonics, that you have these Mid Atlantic ridges

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and that oceanic ridges, where you are having divergent plates, so the plates are moving away
from each other and oceanic crust is getting created in these regions. So, how do these mid
oceanic ridges look like?

(Refer Slide Time: 20:39)

So, this is a map and you can observe that these are roughly all over the planet. So there are
for 65000 kilometers.

(Refer Slide Time: 20:48)

Then we have the Seamounts. So these are mountains in the sea. So mountains with pointed
summits rising from the sea floor, but not reaching the surface of the ocean. If they reach the
surface they become islands if they do not reach we call them Seamounts or Sea mountains.
They are often volcanic in origin similar to our composite volcanoes can reach a height of up

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to 4.5 kilometers such as the Emperor seamount in Hawaii. And they alter and slow down
currents leading to enhance deposition of organic matter which acts as food for the animals.

(Refer Slide Time: 21:30)

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So, what we are saying here is that if you have these abyssal planes and then there is a
mountain and all of this region is deep below the ocean surface. Now, in this case, if you
have an ocean current that is moving like this, so the ocean currents will carry with it certain
sediments now, when this ocean current meets the seamount, so, there is an abrupt stoppage
or there is a deflection of this ocean current.

So two things can happen one, it can be stopped or the speed reduces, and two, it gets
deflected upwards. Now when this speed reduces, the ability of this current to carry the
sediments also reduces, which leads to the deposition of these sediments here. And two, if it
moves upwards, then it is leading to an upwelling. So these are two things that the seamounts
do; one, they lead to deposition of sediments, and two, they lead to upwelling.

Now, when they slow down the currents, there is enhanced deposition of organic matter. And
this matter can act as food for animals. So they typically support a larger amount of animal
life as compared to the abyssal plains. And in certain other locations, the flowing water
washes off the sediments, exposing the hard rocks that provide a place for attachment for
many animals, such as corals and sponges, while also constantly bringing food to these
sessile animals through the water currents.

So what we are saying here is that at these locations, where the oceanic currents collide with
the seamounts, you will not find a much deposition of sediments, because this water that is
moving at a high speed, it is washing it away. So in these locations, you have hard rocks that
get exposed. And a number of organisms that are attaching organisms, they can attach
themselves to these hard rocks. So in this case, what we find is that you have certain areas in

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the seamounts that have abundant amount of sediments, and certain other areas that are
exposed.

So you can have different kinds of organisms that are supported in these two different areas.
Certain organisms that require sediments to live, they can live in the sediment rich areas, and
certain other organisms that require a hard rock to attach themselves to and live in the
exposed areas. Now if the animals attach themselves to these exposed areas, so if you have an
animal here, the other good thing is that this animal will always be getting food because of
the oceanic currents that we will be bringing different sediments and different organic matter
that can be used as food.

These sessile animals because these animals are attached they cannot move, but still because
the water is moving so they are constantly getting food. They provide a more heterogeneous
habitat. Because you have habitats at different heights, different surfaces, from soft sediments
to hard rocks, then the abyssal plains.

(Refer Slide Time: 25:09)

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And these different habitats, more food and provisioning of resting places to transport it
larvae lead to a large biodiversity in these areas with a predominance of suspension feeders,
such as corals in the seamounts and the organisms found are often very different from those
found in the abyssal plains, because the habitat is different. So, it supports a very different
biodiversity as compared to the abyssal plains.

So, you have different habitats, varied habitats, also lots of food. And so, you have a large
variety of organisms that are formed. The interaction of seamounts with the currents leads to
localized upwelling of water, lifting nutrients from deep waters to sunlight surface waters.

And when this happens, when the nutrients are being pushed upwards, then what happens in
this region, you have a photosynthetic zone. Because in these locations, you have abundant

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amount of sunlight, and you are also getting these nutrients from these oceanic currents. And
so, you will have a lot of food production that goes on in this area.

Now, what will happen to all this food, when these organisms die, they will either be eaten
away by the other organisms or else they will settle down. And when they settle down, where
will they settle down? They will settle down on this seamount. So, this is another source of
nutrients that is made available for the animals that live on the seamounts.

So essentially, they are extremely rich in biodiversity. They are like the oasis in our deserts.
But because you have a lot of organisms, it also means that there is a lot of possibility to
harm them. Seamounts are especially affected by mining activity, where the sediment plumes
disturb and harm the living organisms. So whenever we are doing a mining in the oceans, and
typically mining is done for things such as manganese nodules.

So, if this mining has to go on, in any case, in that case, we should be careful that mining is
not permitted near the seamounts, or else these oases in the deserts they themselves will be
lost and with them all the organisms that live there will also be lost. So they are very
important from the point of view of conservation. So this is a seamount.

(Refer Slide Time: 27:55)

This is how a seamount looks like so this is the Kahalewai seamount.

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(Refer Slide Time: 28:02)

Next we have the Guyots. Guyots are flat topped seamounts. So they are very similar to the
plateaus that we have on the lithosphere. So a plateau is a hill with a flat top. And similarly
we have the guyots below the water. The top has a cap of carbonate rock that is laid down by
corals when the seamount was at the ocean surface perhaps millions of years ago. What does
that mean?

Well, basically, when we talk about global warming, what is happening is that more and more
amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is leading to an enhanced greenhouse effect,
because of which the ice caps are melting and water is moving into the oceans raising the sea
level.

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Now think about this process in reverse. When the planet cools down, then more and more
water starts getting stored in the ice caps because any precipitation in those areas any
snowfall in that area will not be melted and so the ice caps start growing in size. When that
happens, the sea level falls. And we can observe a large number of examples, where the sea
levels have changed over geological time scales.

(Refer Slide Time: 29:25)

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So, earlier, if you had the sea level, say at this level and in those days, suppose there was a
seamount that rose to the surface in that case what would happen. Now, on the surface of the
sea, you have the sea waves and these sea waves would be colliding against the top of this
mountain and essentially they will lead to erosion so that this top becomes a flat area. So in
that case, the seamount would get this flat top.

Now this happened when the sea levels were less. Later on when, when the planet starts to
warm up, you have water that moves from the snow caps from the polar ice caps into the
ocean and so the water level begins to rise. So, now this is the water level. When that
happens, this top portion of the flat top mountain, it now becomes an extremely productive
zone because you have abundant amount of sunlight and you also have a surface on which
various organisms can attach themselves. And typically, you will find a large amount of coral
growth in this area.

Now corals as we have observed, they have an exoskeleton that is made up of calcium
compounds. And so you have a lot of calcium deposition that goes on here. When the corals
die their exoskeletons remain, and so you have a lot of calcium in this area, then later on,
when the planet warms even further, this portion raises even further and then there will be a
time after which this portion or the seamounts will have become so deep that it is now no
longer able to support the corals. So now we do not find corals here on the top, but we still
have a top cap of calcium compounds.

Mostly carbonates. So the top has a cap of carbonate rocks laid down by corals when the
seamount was at the ocean surface perhaps millions of years ago. And this flat top permits the
accumulation of sediments over time, often up to several meters in depth. So what happens

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now if there is any sedimentation in this area, because you have a flat top with lots of
carbonates, so the sediments are able to accumulate in this areas.

And so you have a layer of sediments, even several meters in depth. The sedimented top and
the hard rock sides provide contrasting habitats enriching the biodiversity not only by
providing shelter to different organisms, but also to the predators that feed on them. So now,
once you have a layer of sediments on the top, you can have sediment dwelling organisms,
and on the sides you can have say those organisms that prefer living on hard rocks. So here
again you have a differentiated habitat because of which you can have a greater amount of
biodiversity. The flat tops may be guyots, the easiest types of seamounts to trawl for fish or
mine for minerals.

(Refer Slide Time: 32:56)

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Now here comes the conservation challenge, because if you wanted to mine for say
manganese nodules here, in that case, you have to bring these nodules from this depth. But if
there are manganese nodules here, you only have to bring them from this depth. And so the
guyots are heavily mined. At the same time, because you have an abundance of food in this
area, you also have a lot of fishes in these areas.

And these areas being flat top, it is easier for trawlers to access them. So if you trawl these
areas, your nets will not be entangled to something and so they are heavily trawled. And with
both of these activities, mining and trawling, there is a very great amount of destruction to the
biodiversity that is happening in the guyots. So these are the easiest types of seamounts to
trawl for fish or mine for minerals does endangering the biodiversity.

(Refer Slide Time: 34:00)

This is how a flat top guyot looks like. So you can observe that this was essentially a
seamount, but with its top that is cut off.

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(Refer Slide Time: 34:09)

These are the kinds of organisms that we find there are sediment-dwelling sea cucumber,
which is living on the sediments on the top.

(Refer Slide Time: 34:18)

You also have a sediment-dwelling shrimp. So these are some examples of the unique
biodiversity that is found in the guyots.

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(Refer Slide Time: 34:26)

Another feature is the Submarine canyons. Now we had talked about canyons such as the
Grand Canyon, which are deep valleys that are made by the erosional activity of rivers. Now
similar to the canyons that we find on the lithosphere or on the land, we also have submarine
canyons below the sea level. So these are deep valleys, often cutting across continental
shelves and slopes and they extend from the mouth of large rivers such as the Hudson
Canyon.

So, in this case, what is a submarine Canyon? It is an extension of the erosional activity of the
river. So, once the river has reached into the seas, the very fast flow of water it continues to a
distance. And in that process, it goes on eroding the continental shelf and the continental
slope resulting in very similar features as the canyons that are found on the land.

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(Refer Slide Time: 35:28)

So, this is how it will look like. So, in this case, we have the continental shelf and the
continental slope and we can find that these are very deep valleys that have been created.

(Refer Slide Time: 35:42)

Now, when we talk about the Hudson Canyon, here, you are going to observe that this is 0
meters above sea level. So, this is the sea level, all these portions on the left they are below
the sea level. So, these regions are below the sea level and the river ends here, but you are
finding that there is a valley that has been created. So this is a Submarine canyon.

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(Refer Slide Time: 36:10)

Another prominent feature is the Atolls. Atolls are low islands consisting of coral reefs
surrounding a central depression. So, these are low islands, meaning that they do not have a
very great height consisting of coral reefs that surround a central depression. So, they are
primarily formed because of biological activity of coral reefs. The depressions may or may
not be connected to the seawater.

(Refer Slide Time: 36:43)

This is how an atoll looks like. So, this is a ring of corals, you have a sea in the center and
you have the sea in the surroundings. Now, both of these seas are let us say that this is a lake.
So this lake and the sea may be connected or they may not be connected. So this is an Atoll.

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(Refer Slide Time: 37:04)

Now, along with the features, we can all also talk about the properties of the ocean water.
And in this context, it is important to understand that the ocean water is found in different
layers. So we can talk about the top layer, we can talk about the middle layers, we can talk
about the bottom layer of the water column. And this creates a profile because these different
layers have different properties. And that is known as the water profile.

The density of seawater increases as we go down, which is quite obvious because if you have
denser water, it will typically sink to the bottom and the lighter waters will remain on the top.
But why is the seawater denser in the bottom, it is because of a combination of hydrostatic
pressure, meaning that the water in the bottom is being pushed by a large amount of water
that is there on the top.

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So in this case, if we consider a column, so the pressure at this point is primarily because of
the weight of all of this water plus the atmospheric pressure at this point. So this results in a
huge amount of pressure here, but the pressure at this point is equal to the atmospheric
pressure. So the pressure increases with depth, which we have also observed before. Now
water can be compressed to a very small extent. But with the increase in pressure, this
compression increases the density of water. So that is one reason.

Second salinity the waters in the bottom of the ocean are typically more saline. And why are
they more saline. This is because of a conveyor belt system in the oceans, we will have a look
at it in a later lecture. But essentially what happens is that the water near the polar areas,
when it freezes, the water gets converted into the ice and all the salts that were there in the
water, because this is this being oceanic water or sea water it is rich in salts.

So the salts are left out in a process that is known as phase separation. And these waters move
to the bottom of the ocean. So the salinity in the bottom is also high and third is temperature.
The bottoms of the ocean are typically at around 4 degrees Celsius, at which temperature
water has the highest density. So a combination of all these three forces means that the
density of the water is highest at the bottom.

(Refer Slide Time: 39:54)

And if we draw isopycnal curves which is equal density curves, this is what it will look like.
So, the bottom has here a density of greater than 26 kilogram per meter cube, whereas the top
water has a density of around 20.5 kg per meter cube. So, the density increases as we move
down.

529
(Refer Slide Time: 40:16)

Then the horizontal temperature distribution is also different in different areas. So, now, we
are talking about the temperature differences horizontally, meaning that in the same layer,
what is the temperature in different locations and this is governed by the latitude, so the
regions near the equator are warmer than those towards the poles we have seen this before.
An unequal distribution of land and water, oceans in the Northern Hemisphere are warmer
due to more land in the Northern Hemisphere.

Now, typically when we get sunshine, the land gets heated up much better and much quickly,
much more quickly than the oceanic water and this heat is then channelized to the oceans.
And so in the Northern Hemisphere because we have more amount of land, so the oceans also
typically are warmer than those in the southern hemisphere. Then prevailing winds, offshore
winds blow warm water away from the coast resulting in and the resulting upwelling results
in cooling. Onshore water winds pile of warm waters raising the temperature.

530
(Refer Slide Time: 41:37)

So what we are saying here is that if we consider this configuration now the top layer is
generally warmer. And if you have winds that blow from the coast towards the ocean, what
will happen is this warm water will be moved to far off locations. And when this warm water
is moved away, the space that gets created here will be filled up by upwelling from the
bottom. And so, winds that are moving towards the sea or towards the ocean, they result in a
lowering of temperature of the sea surface.

On the other hand, if you have winds that are moving in the opposite direction, in that case,
all of this water will be piled towards the sea coast. And so higher temperatures will be
recorded in the sea surface. Then we have the role of ocean currents. If there are warm

531
currents, they will raise the temperature if there are cold currents, they will reduce the
temperature.

(Refer Slide Time: 42:51)

532
Then we also have the impact of enclosing of seas. In the case of enclosed seas that are
surrounded by land from all side, we do not have a large movement of water. And so the
temperatures will typically move towards the extremes. In the lower latitudes that is near the
equator, the enclosed seas are warmer than the open seas. In higher latitudes that is near the
poles, the enclosed seas are colder than the open seas due to a reduced movement of water.
And these factors create a unique latitudinal and longitudinal distribution of ocean
temperatures that looks like this.

So this is the sea surface temperature. And here you have the equator and it is easy to observe
that in the northern hemisphere, it is more warmer in the southern hemisphere it is more
cooler. And in the case of enclosed seas, you have a temperature that is greater than the open
oceans in the same latitude. So this is the horizontal distribution of temperature.

The vertical distribution reveals a warm upper layer since the oceans received most of their
heat from the Sun and a cold lower layer where the Sun's heat does not reach and a
thermocline in between both of these layers.

533
(Refer Slide Time: 44:15)

So the top layer is warmer, the bottom layer is colder and then in between you have a
thermocline. Thermocline is a layer where the temperature decreases rapidly from the mixed
upper layer to the cold deeper layer. This thermocline may vary from several meters near the
tropics to a few meters near the poles, where the surface temperatures themselves are low. So
when the surface temperature itself is low, then there is hardly any thermocline.

The depth of the thermocline is important for the forecasting of hurricanes and cyclones.
Since the warm water layer about the thermocline provides the energy for the formation and
sustenance of the hurricanes. So, we had observed this before in the case of cyclones, the
tropical cyclones get most of their energy because of the heat and the condensation of water
that occurs.

534
Now, the warm surface layer of the seas and oceans, it provides the energy for the formation
and the sustenance of the cyclones. And so, if this warm upper layer is very deep or very
thick, it would mean that there is a lot of energy that is available for the cyclones and in that
case, cyclones will be formed much more easily and they will be much more severe.

On the other hand, if the thermocline is near the surface, it means that the upper layer of the
seas is very thin, which means that not enough energy is available and so, either the cyclones
will not be formed or if they are formed, they will not be that severe. So, this is the isotherm
curves iso means same, therm is temperature. So, these are the curves that joint points at the
same temperature. And here as well, we can observe that the top layer is warmer and the
bottom layer is colder at around 4 degrees.

(Refer Slide Time: 46:19)

535
So, if we plot the thermocline this is how it will look like on the x axis here we have the
temperature. So, the top layer is at around 13 degrees Celsius, the bottom layer is around 4
degrees Celsius and this is a thermocline.

Then we have the salinity distribution, the salinity distribution is governed by evaporation,
precipitation, inflow of fresh water from rivers, phase separation near the poles and mixing of
water by events and ocean currents. So, there are a number of factors that govern the salinity.
If you have evaporation, then water is removed as water vapor and the salts remain increasing
the salinity.

If there is precipitation or rainfall over the seas, then the inflow of the freshwater from in the
form of rains will reduce the salinity. If there is an inflow of fresh water from the rivers, that
again will reduce the solidity.

(Refer Slide Time: 47:27)

536
If there is a phase separation, especially near the poles, so in the case of phase separation,
when we talk about water, that is having the salts when this water freezes, then the ice that
gets formed, it will not be having any salt. So, this ice will be all made out of water. So, what
happens to the salts, the salts are moved out. So, only the pure water gets into the ice and the
salts are left behind because of which the concentration of salts in the remaining water will go
up.

Now, this process is known as a phase separation, because the water phase is separating itself
from the salt phase and because of this phase separation, we find that near the poles, the
water is extremely saline and this saline water is also extremely dense it is extremely cold and
so it moves down towards the ocean bottoms, to jumpstart a conveyor belt circulation of
water in the oceans, we will have a look at it in a later lecture.

And mixing of water by winds and ocean currents. So, if there is a mixing of waters that will
also change the salinity. A stratification is often observed but it is not always observed. So,
you can have a stratification in which case the top layer has a different salinity, but it is not
always necessary.

537
(Refer Slide Time: 48:52)

So, this is the Isohaline curves which is the equal salinity curves in the units of PSU, so, PSU
is Practical Salinity Unit, which is very close to per mill. No per mill, it is very similar to the
concept of percent. So, when we say percent, we mean how many parts in 100 units of
something, when we say per mill, it is how many parts per 1000 units of something. So, for
1000 units of water, what is the amount of salt? So, that is what this PSU is referring to.

Now, in this curve, we can observe that below you have a salinity that is close to around 34.6.
Then here in the top you have a higher salinity, but then in the layer above this, you have a
lower salinity. So, essentially the salinity is a property that is very difficult to characterize in
terms of general rules. So, for instance, in the case of temperature, we can always say that the

538
top layer will be having a higher temperature, and the temperature will go down as we move
down.

But we cannot say a very similar thing in the case of salinity, because it is governed by a
number of factors that keep on changing. So, it is possible that the top layer has a high
salinity, but then you have a rainfall and so the salinity drops. So, because of that we cannot
make a general rule.

(Refer Slide Time: 50:38)

If you look at the horizontal distribution of salinity, this is what it looks like. So, there are
certain areas that have a higher salinity, there are certain areas that have a lower salinity. And
typically near the poles you have a very high salinity because of the phase separation. And
near the equator, you have a lower salinity, mostly because you have a lot of rainfall that
occurs in this area.

539
(Refer Slide Time: 51:04)

Now, in this context, we can also talk about the Economic importance of the oceans. Now,
oceans are very important from the point of view of economics, because when we talk about
a number of resources, when we talk about fishes, the oceans have lots of fishes. So, catching
of these fishes sustains a very large fishing industry. There are also other animals that live in
the oceans, they can also be harvested.

The ocean bottoms have nodules of metals such as manganese, they can be mined from there,
the ocean is also a big source of salts as well as water. So, a lot of water can also be made use
of say, by putting it through a desalination process. So it can be converted into fresh water to
be used for drinking or to be used for agriculture. Similarly, when we talk about the waves, or
the winds that are blowing in this area, then they can be used as renewable sources of energy.

When we talk about the continental shelves, we saw that there is a lot of deposition of
sediments in those areas, a lot of deposition of fossils, which over time have been converted
into fossil fuels, especially petroleum and natural gas. So these can be extracted from these
areas. So the oceans have a very big economic importance. Areas that are near the shores that
become often become port cities because they have an important place in global trade.

You have a lot of tourists that come to sea beaches. So there is a huge amount of economic
activity that goes on near the oceans. Now, who owns the oceans? This question was resolved
by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Now, this convention sees that, till a distance
of 12 nautical miles will say that this is a territorial sea. And in the territorial sea, there is a
complete sovereignty of the nation that is here.

540
And this sovereignty extends to the water column to the airspace above and to the seabed and
subsoil. So all of this belongs to the country that is here. Then we have a contiguous zone
from 12 nautical miles to 24 nautical miles, where we have a limited law enforcement activity
of this nation.

Then up to 200 nautical miles, we have an exclusive economic zone or the EEZ where the
nation has sovereign rights over natural resources of the water column and the seabed and the
subsoil. So all of this belongs to the nation. But the, the resources here, they do not belong to
this nation because there is no sovereignty. This is just an exclusive economic zone.

Then we have the extended continental shelf, followed by the high seas. Now, the nations
maintain sovereign rights over natural resources in the seabed and the sub soil in the extended
continental shelf as well. So extended continental shelf is defined as a maximum of 315
nautical miles from the cost or baseline or 100 nautical miles beyond the 2500 meter isobath
whichever is greatest. What is 2500 meter isobath? It is the point at which the depth of water
is 2500 meters.

So, if you take this point, if you plot it, we can take 100 miles to the outside. And this is the,
this is defined as the extended continental shelf. So up to this point, you have a sovereign
right of this nation, beyond, you have the high seas. And in this case, you do not have any
sovereign rights and all the nations have equal rights to exploit the resources in these areas.
Now, such an arrangement was made to resolve the disputes between different nations
regarding who owns these resources.

There are a number of problems with such arrangements such as what happens when the
coastlines are in the form of a curve. So, in that case, multiple nations can hold sovereign
rights over the same resources. But there is also another point that becomes very important
from the point of view of conservation. Suppose, the nation that holds sovereign rights, if that
nation is doing an activity, that is also polluting the seas.

Then in that case, because the seas and oceans are all one single connected body, then the
impacts will be felt by the other areas as well. And we have observed examples, such as in
the cases where the, the oil rigs in the continental shelves have leaked oils, or they have
exploded as in the case of the Deepwater Horizon accident. Now, in that case, the petroleum
that gets released, it floats and it reaches to very far off areas.

541
So while the countries have a sovereign right over these areas, it is important that any activity
that is done in these areas is done with a lot of prudence and with a lot of concern for the
environment. Because if something goes wrong, the impacts will be felt over a very large
area. Similarly, when we talk about these exclusive economic rights, if the nation does an
overfishing, or an over exploitation of resources, then it is possible that the biodiversity will
get lost, or it is even possible that certain species will be pushed towards extinction.

So while the oceans have an economic role, it is important that we do not look at them just
from the point of view of economics. You should also have a look at them from the point of
view of biodiversity, because biodiversity is something that belongs to all of us. And it is
everybody's responsibility to protect, preserve and conserve this biodiversity. So if something
is going wrong in your area, it is your duty to point it out, and try to stop it. So that is all for
today. Thank you for your attention. Jai Hind!

542
 Conservation Geography
Dr. Ankur Awadhiya, IFS
Indian Forest Service
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Module - 5
Hydrosphere
Lecture - 14
Oceans and Water Movement

(Refer Slide Time: 00:13)

Namaste! We move forward with our discussion on the hydrosphere and in this lecture, we
shall explore oceans and water movement.

(Refer Slide Time: 00:29)

543
Now, oceans formed the largest portion of the hydrosphere. And so, the major water
movements in the ocean become very important. The major water movements that happen in
the ocean are the ocean currents, upwelling, tides and waves. And we should have a look at
all these four types of movements in this lecture.

(Refer Slide Time: 00:50)

So, let us begin with the ocean currents. Ocean currents are defined as regular movement of
water in a definite path and direction. So, it is a regular movement of water, it is not that the
water moves at some times and the water does not move at other times, it is a regular
continuous movement of water in a definite path and direction. So, when we talk about ocean
currents, we can tell the exact path and exact direction that water takes when it moves in the
form of a current.

So, this is a regular movement of water in a definite path and direction. And there are two
kinds of forces that play a role in the ocean currents. The first is the primary forces that
initiate and govern the movement. So, they are the main forces that start the currents and that
govern the movement and most of the properties of the currents. These include phase
separation. Now, phase separation is a process in which when a liquid with a solute is frozen,
then the frozen portion contains only the molecules of the liquid, whereas all the solutes are
left out.

544
(Refer Slide Time: 02:23)

545
So, essentially, if we take a tumbler of brine, which is salty water, so, here you have water.
And this water has a lot of salt in it. And if you take this tumbler and if you put it into a
freezer, you will find that ice grows. And so we get a block of ice that has developed. And
when this ice gets formed, then this ice come contains only of the water molecules, it does
not contain any salt.

So, it is not a salty ice. It is an ice that is made out of freshwater. And so, what happens to the
salts, the salts are left out and they become more and more concentrated. Now, with time you
will have a situation in which the majority of this tumbler will be filled with ice. In this case,
all of this is ice and we will be left with this portion which is a highly concentrated salt
solution.

So, this is a salt solution, which is highly concentrated. So, when we talk about phase
separation, it is the separation of both the phases the solute and the solvent. And it occurs
when the solution is put up for freezing. It also happens in a number of other circumstances
say when crystals are being formed, but for the context of hydrology, we are more or less
interested in the phase separation that happens in the case of salty water when it is being
frozen.

Now it becomes very important in the case of thermohaline circulation, because what is
happening here is that when you are reducing the temperature, you are getting a ice that is
made out of pure water and you are getting a very highly concentrated salt solution. Now this
salt solution that remains it has a number of properties, 1, it is very saline, 2, it is also very
cold because it is resulting when the water is being frozen and so, the temperatures are also
very less.

Now, if you have a water that is cold and that is full of salts in that case that water will be
very dense because of 2 reasons; one water has the highest density at around 4 degrees
Celsius. So, if you reduce the temperature, the water becomes more and more dense and the
water also has a high load of salt, which also increases the weight per unit volume. So, with
both of these, it becomes very dense water.

Now, if we consider the polar areas, where this process is going on where the water is very
cold and it is freezing, and it is giving out the salts, so, that the resultant water is very high in
salt concentration and is very cold. Where will this water go? Well, this water is the densest
water that we have. And so, this water will move down it will move from the surface of the
ocean down towards the ocean bottom. And so this jumpstarts a process that is known as the

546
thermohaline circulation or the global conveyor belt. And we will look at it in more detail in a
short while.

So, this is one primary force that initiates and governs the movement of water under the
primary forces heating. So, if the water is being heated, you will get things like convection
currents or you will have forces like winds that get developed. So, the third primary force is
wind.

(Refer Slide Time: 07:16)

In this case, if you have the body of water and there is continuously a wind that is flowing in
a particular defined direction. Now, the water molecules that are there on the surface, they
will also interact this with this wind and they will also start to move in this particular

547
direction. And this will result in the generation of a surface current. So, winds are also
primary forces that initiate and govern the movement.

Another force is gravity. So, when we are talking about phase separation, the water that is
very dense is very cool is moving down because of gravity. So, gravity plays a role in the
movement of water. Once this dense and cold water reaches to the bottom of the oceans,
where will it go from there? Well, it will take the path that takes it even further down.

(Refer Slide Time: 08:24)

So, for instance, if this is the continental shelf, then we have the slope and then we have the
abyssal plain and we are getting ice formation in this place which will result in a very dense
water. So, this dense water it was formed here it moved down because of gravity and once it

548
is reached to the floor, it will now move along the surface. So, it will be very similar to the
flow of water overland.

Now, this water is behaving like a very different water from all the remaining water that is
here. This denser water it is flowing like a river and this is flowing like a river because of
gravity. So, this movement of water is being done because of gravity. Another primary force
is the Coriolis force, because it governs the movement.

And as we have observed before, Coriolis force is a fictitious force that happens when you
have movement on a body that is rotating with respect to an inertial frame of reference. Now
because the Earth is rotating, so any movement in the Northern Hemisphere will be turned
towards right.

Any movement in the southern hemisphere will be turned towards left with the Coriolis force
being maximum at the poles and 0 at the equator. So, Coriolis force, because it defines the
direction of movement of water. So, it is also a primary force then we have secondary forces
that alter the movement. So, these secondary forces include shape of the ocean floor.

So, when we say that this water is moving along the ocean floor, then it is following the
contours of the ocean floor, meaning that if the ocean floor has a different configuration, this
water will perhaps move differently. So, this becomes a secondary force it becomes a
secondary factor that is altering the movement, it is not initiating the movement, it is not
governing the movement, but it is bringing about smaller alterations. Similarly, the
arrangement of coast.

(Refer Slide Time: 10:55)

549
So, when we have a surface water. So, in this body, when we have a current that is moving on
the surface, when it reaches to this coast, then it cannot move on the land, because this is a
water current. So, depending on the shape of the coast, this water will have to change its
direction.

So, in this case, the shape of the coast also becomes a secondary force or a secondary factor
which is altering the movement of water it is not initiating it is not governing the movement,
it is just altering the movement of water. So, these are the two kinds of forces that play a role.

(Refer Slide Time: 11:52)

Now, ocean currents are divided by depth into surface currents and deep currents. Now,
surface currents are fast currents typically around 10 to 100 centimeters per second. But they

550
move away a very small amount of water just 10 percent of ocean water moves because of
surface currents. And they arise due to winds and tides. So, there they are on the surface.

On the other hand, we also have deep currents, which are very slow, typically a few
centimeters per second, but they move a large quantity of water as much as 90 percent of
movement of ocean waters is due to the deep currents. And these deep currents are mostly the
thermohaline circulation that we just talked about. So deep currents are slow, but they move a
large quantity of ocean waters, and they arise due to thermohaline circulation.

Now, depending on temperature, we can have cold currents and we can have warm currents.
Now cold currents are typically on the west coast of continents, in low and middle latitudes in
both the hemispheres and on the east coast of continents in the higher latitudes in the
Northern Hemisphere. Now, when we talk about these west coast and east coast, this is
occurring because of the Coriolis forces that change the direction of these currents.

Similarly, we have warm currents on the east coast of continents in low and middle latitudes
in both the hemispheres and on the west coast of continents in the higher latitudes in the
Northern Hemisphere.

(Refer Slide Time: 13:31)

551
So, this is how it looks like in this chart, that red colour is indicating the warm currents and
the blue colour is indicating the cold currents. So now, let us zoom up this chart and have a
look. Now near India, we have this warm current which is the Somali current which is
originating here near Somalia, it moves like this and then on the west coast, it turns like this
and then it joins the equatorial current, the North equatorial current.

In the Bay of Bengal also we have this movement. Now you will notice here that India being
in the Northern Hemisphere, these currents are turning towards their right in the southern
hemisphere, the currents are turning towards their left. And here we have in the Indian Ocean,
we have the West Australian current which is a cold current it moves then it warms up and it
becomes a part of the South equatorial current.

Now because the North equatorial current is moving westward and the South equatorial
current is moving westwards, typically here we get an excess amount of water and this flows
towards the east in the form of an equatorial counter current. And all of these are warm
currents. Then this South equatorial current, it moves along the coast of Africa, in the form of
Agulhas current which then splits and becomes a part of the wind drift in the southern
hemisphere.

552
(Refer Slide Time: 15:13)

This wind drift also splits here to reach the southern coast of Australia. So, this is a cold
current. Now near the Antarctica, we have the west wind drift and the east wind drift. And all
of these are cold currents.

553
(Refer Slide Time: 15:34)

Now, in the Atlantic Ocean in the South Atlantic, here we have the Benguela current. Again,
here you can note that the currents are turning to their left, this being the southern
hemisphere. So, you have the Benguela current, which is a cold current, and it touches the
western coast of Africa.

Now being a cold current, it reduces the temperature and at the same time, it makes the air
very dry. And so, this area will typically have deserts. So, we have the Namib Desert here.
Then it meets with the South equatorial current. And here is well we have the equatorial
counter current and the North equatorial current.

Now, the South equatorial current moves southwards in the form of Brazil current and this is
a warm current, now being a warm current, it will increase the temperatures and it will create
more amount of rainfall because it will make the air more humid and then this will ultimately
join the west wind drift.

554
(Refer Slide Time: 16:49)

In the northern Atlantic, we have this north equatorial current, which then moves in the form
of Gulf Stream. So, the Gulf Stream is a warm current to in the Northern Hemisphere, what
we are observing is that the eastern coasts are having the warm currents and the western
courts are having the cold currents.

Now, this Gulf Stream continues in the form of North Atlantic current then it turns and
becomes the Canary current. Now Canary current is a cold current. So, here as well you will
find less amount of rainfall. So, these areas will be typically drier.

(Refer Slide Time: 17:30)

Then this North Atlantic current it moves further becomes the Norwegian current. So, this is
a warm current it moves towards the polar regions becomes cold and then it becomes a cold

555
current. This cold current then moves in the form of East Greenland current and here you can
observe that it is following the coast. So, when we said that the shape of the coast plays a
role, here you are observing that the shape of the coast is actually playing a role.

Otherwise probably this current would have moved like this. So, because the Greenland is
like this, so we have this current that is following the coast. And then in this area, it becomes
the Labrador current which is a cold current, it moves south and then it joins the North
Atlantic current.

(Refer Slide Time: 18:21)

In the Pacific Ocean, we have the Alaskan current which is a warm current. So, again here
this here we have a warm current and then it continues in the form of Californian current
which is a cold current. Here we have the North Pacific current which also joins it. So,

556
Californian and current being a cold current, it will reduce the temperatures and it will reduce
the rainfall. So, the western portion will be typically drier.

(Refer Slide Time: 18:56)

Then we have the North equatorial current, South equatorial current and the equatorial
counter current. Now in the South Pacific, we have the Peru current. Now this Peru current
again is a cold current. And so these areas will be cold and dry. And so we again have deserts
in this area.

(Refer Slide Time: 19:22)

557
Now, moving to the south, we have the Antarctic Circumpolar Current which continues as the
west wind drift and here the cold portion continues in the form of in the North Pacific it
continues in the form of cold current which is known as Oyashio current and here we have
the warm Kuroshio current. So, these are moving in opposite directions.

(Refer Slide Time: 19:52)

558
And in the South Pacific, we have the East Australian current which is a warm current. Now
here again because this is a warm current, so, these areas will get more amount of rainfall,
this Western Australia, West Australian current being a cold current, these areas will have
less rainfall. So, typically you can observe that the east coast of Australia is better because of
which we are getting more amount of forests the west coast of Australia is more drier and so,
this portion it is appearing to be dry. So, on the basis of temperature we have cold currents
and we have the warm currents.

(Refer Slide Time: 20:34)

Now, let us talk about the global conveyor belt or the thermohaline circulation. Now, this is
one of the most important movements of water. It is moving as much as 90 percent of the
water that is being moved in the oceans is being moved because of this conveyor belt.

559
(Refer Slide Time: 20:59)

Now, this conveyor belt starts from North Atlantic and in this area, this area being very cold,
we are getting a phase separation. So, the water that remains is very cold, it is very salty, it is
very dense, and so, it sinks down. Once it has sunk down it moves along the ocean floor
towards the south.

(Refer Slide Time: 21:27)

Then it is recharged near Antarctica, what do we mean by that, we had a phase separation
here and similarly, we have a phase separation here. And so, here again this current gets even
more amount of cold, salty, dense water and so, it continues like this.

560
(Refer Slide Time: 21:48)

Next, this current splits into two portions, one portion enters the Indian Ocean the another
portion enters into the Pacific Ocean.

(Refer Slide Time: 21:57)

And these branches then warm up once they warm, they become lighter and they rise. So,
here we are observing that this current is now rising, and it has now become a warm current.
Similarly, here, this current has now risen and it is now a warm current. Now, we are talking
about the surface movement of water.

561
(Refer Slide Time: 22:19)

And this water then moves in these routes to reach back into the Atlantic, the North Atlantic
and so, all this water is now moving like this, you have a surface movement like this, you
have this surface movement and all of this moves back into the North Atlantic and so this
current continues. So, this is the global conveyor belt or the thermohaline circulation. Now,
what is this current actually doing?

So, as you can observe that in the colder areas, this current is carrying cold, salty, dense water
towards the equatorial regions. So, it is taking cold water from cold areas moving them
towards the equator and near the tropics it is getting warmed to this current warms it rises and
then it moves the warm water towards the poles. So, essentially, this current is getting its
energy from the difference in temperatures in the equatorial regions and in the polar regions.

And it is moving heat that is thermal energy from the equator towards the poles. So, this is
very important. Now, when it moves thermal energy from away from the equator, it means
that the equatorial areas or the tropical areas are not that warm as they would have been if this
current was not functioning. And because it is carrying thermal energy towards the poles, the
poles are not that cold as they would have been if we did not have the circulation.

So, in essence this circulation is actually moderating the temperatures, it is making equatorial
areas less hot and it is making the polar areas less cold which has very important
ramifications not just for biodiversity but also for human beings. The equatorial areas
typically are very hot and if this current stops, they will become even more hotter. In those
situations, how will people live there?

562
Similarly, in the cold in the polar areas, they are already very cold. And if this current stops
to move water, then they will become even further colder. Then how will humans live there?
So, this current plays a very important role in moderating temperatures. And in this way it
helps sustain life, even in those areas of Earth that would be having a very extreme
temperature if these currents were not working. So, this is how the thermohaline circulation
works.

(Refer Slide Time: 25:19)

Another current that we have is the longshore current. Waves arrive at an angle to the sea
beach; the angle is known as the angle of wave approach. So essentially, if this is the sea
beach, the waves are arriving at an angle to the sea beach. When waves reach a beach, they
release a burst of energy that causes movement of water parallel to the beach, what is

563
happening is that when these waves, when they hit the beach, there is a transfer of energy, the
waves are carrying energy.

And now this energy is made available at this point. Now, with this energy, the water starts to
move and the movement of this water will be parallel to the shore or parallel to the beach. So,
it causes a movement of water parallel to the beach. And the continuous beaching of waves
generates a continuous drift that may result in large scale erosion or deposition. So what is
happening is that you do not just have one wave, but you have a train of waves.

So, we get waves one after another. And so, once the first wave has touched the beach, it has
started to release its energy and when this wave moves forward, another location will get the
burst of energy, then another location will get the burst of energy and so on.

(Refer Slide Time: 26:54)

564
So, essentially what is happening is that if this is the sea beach, and we have the wave that is
moving at this angle, now the wave is moving in this direction. So, in the first instance, we
have a release of energy here, then later on, when the wave reaches like this, we have a
release of energy here, then later on, we have a release of energy here, but then, the release of
energy at any point is not a one-off incident, because this wave is being followed by another
parallel wave which is being followed by another parallel wave and so on.

So, what happens is that this train of waves, it goes on releasing energy in this sequence. So,
you will have energy release first here, then here, then here and so on. So, at all of these
points, we are getting a release of energy in this direction. And when that happens, water
starts to move and water will follow the shape of the beach.

The water will be moving parallel to the beach. So, in this case, when the waves are hitting at
an angle, we get a movement of water that is like this. So, you get a continuous movement of
water parallel to the beach, and this is the long shore current. Now, when the water is
moving, then the water may result in erosion or it will result in deposition. So, what is the
water going to erode?

The water is going to erode the sand that is there on the beach. So, this is a movement of
water that is parallel to the beach and water being a very good geomorphological agent, it
will do its regular job erosion and deposition. So, when it erodes away the sand, the beaches
will reduce in size, when it deposits the sand somewhere later in those locations, the beaches
may expand or it may even result in the formation of other structures such as the spits.

565
So, we had observed spit in one of the earlier lectures, and the spits are formed because of the
longshore currents or it may result in the generation of a sand barrier. So, we get different
landforms in the form of eroded beaches, sand barriers, spits and so on that are generated
because of the longshore currents.

Now, the strength of the longshore current depends on a number of factors the speed of the
waves, because both the speed more quickly is the energy getting released, and so the waves
will be more powerful. The angle of the wave approach, the height of the waves and the slope
of the beach.

(Refer Slide Time: 29:59)

Ocean currents play a number of important roles, they help in the movement of energy from
the equator to the poles, meaning that they are transferring energy that is thermal energy from
the equator, which are getting more heated towards the poles, which are having a deficit of
energy. Once that happens, the equatorial areas reduce their temperatures they are not as hot
as they would have been in absence of these currents, and the polar areas become a bit more
warmer than they would be if these currents did not exist.

From the ecological point of view, this helps a number of organisms because it moderates the
conditions in both of these locations, both the equatorial locations and the polar locations.
And from the economic point of view, it makes these areas habitable by human beings. And
we do not have to spend as much amount of energy for climate control as we would have to
spend if these currents were not there.

566
Similarly, cool, nutrient rich waters from deep oceans support a large number of planktons,
algae and seaweed, further supporting a majority of ocean food chains. Now what is
happening with these currents is that the cold water is brought upwards through various
upwelling locations. And this nutrient rich water is being made available for different
organisms. When it comes to the surface, we get a location where we have ample amount of
nutrients plus ample amount of sunshine.

So, the organisms the phytoplankton and the plants will be able to use these nutrients to make
food. Now, ecologically, this will support a large number of food chains in the ocean. And
from an economic point of view, we will be able to harvest this biodiversity that is sustained
by these currents. So, we can perform fishing in these locations to extract these fishes in an
economical manner because we will be having a very large number of fishes.

Cool surface currents reduce the temperature and increase dryness. So, because they are cold,
so they reduce the temperature. So they make it make the surrounding cool and being cold
currents, they do not add moisture to the air. So, they make the air dryer. And so these result
in cool and dry climates. whereas warm surface currents do the opposite thing. They increase
temperature and humidity and result in warm and rainy climates.

Fog occurs where cold and warm currents meet but this also creates the best fishing grounds.
Why? Because the cold currents are bringing in a lot of nutrients. And when they are meeting
with the warm currents, then we have a situation where it is not as cold the temperatures are
also moderated. So, in those circumstances we can have much more amount of biological
productivity as compared to a location that would be having an equal amount of nutrients but
is very cold.

Ocean currents aid navigation by reducing fuel consumption because the waters themselves
are moving. And so any vessels that are floating on this water they will also be moving along
with the currents. So, if you move a ship along the route of a current, then less amount of
energy is required to move the ship. So, it helps to save fuel.

And when these currents move water, they also disperse pollutants, such as oil spills and
plastics, which means that they protect the biodiversity of those areas that are having oil spills
by rapidly moving the oil spill away from that area. But the negative consequence is that it
exposes the biodiversity of other areas to the oil spills, because it is taking this oil to other
locations.

567
So, this has both ecological and economic ramifications. Ecologically, certain communities,
the biological communities get protected, certain other communities become more
vulnerable. And economically, we will have to spend money to treat the oil spill in a larger
area. Otherwise, it would have been much more localized. If the currents take the oil to a
beach, then we will have to clean up the beaches.

If the currents were not there, then probably the oil spill would have been much more
localized. And it also helps in the dispersal of organisms of which the invasive species are the
most important. What happens is that the organisms that need to disperse, they can also hitch
a ride. So, if there is a log that is floating on water, the ocean currents will take this log to
very far off areas and the organisms that need to disperse. If they are sticking to this log,
these organisms will also be taken too far off locations.

So, it aids in the dispersal of organisms. The negative consequence is that it also aids in the
dispersal of invasive species, alien species. Now these invasive alien species if they reach
into some other areas, they can wreak havoc to the local biodiversity. So that is a negative
consequence.

(Refer Slide Time: 36:11)

So, ocean currents play a lot of roles. And here it is important to note the impact of global
warming. 90 percent of the oceanic circulation is happening because of the thermohaline
circulation. And thermohaline circulation works because near the polar areas, the situations
are so cold that ice is forming out of water. And when that happens, we have a phase
separation, which generates cold, dense salty water which starts the thermohaline circulation
process.

568
Now, with global warming it what is happening, the temperatures are going up. And so, in the
polar areas, now we are not getting that much amount of generation of ice. In fact, a lot of
glaciers are already melting. Now when the glaciers melt when these ice caps melt, what
happens is we have fresh water that is pumped into the system in these cold areas. Now, the
thermohaline circulation can only work when you have cold dense water that seeps down,
moves down.

Now if you dilute that water with a lot of fresh water that is generated when you have global
warming due to the melting of ice, you will have a situation where the thermohaline
circulation becomes weaker. We can also reach a point where the thermohaline circulation
stops completely.

Now if the thermohaline circulation stops, what will happen, we will have the equatorial
areas getting warmer and the polar areas getting cooler, which will thankfully again start this
thermohaline circulation because the polar areas will become colder. But then this will have
an impact, a severe ecological and economic impact if the thermohaline circulation weakens
for you in a bit because it will lead to large changes in the habitats.

So, the thermohaline circulation is based upon phase separation in the cold areas that creates
cold, dense, salty water. Global warming is resulting in the melting of glaciers in these areas,
resulting in more warm, light and fresh water which hampers the thermohaline circulation.
And when this happens, the movement of heat from the equator to the poles will reduce
resulting in warmer tropics and colder poles.

And warmer tropical waters will result in more severe cyclones. Why? Because the cyclones
the tropical cyclones, they get their energy from the warm surface waters. So, if the
thermohaline circulation stops, we will have more amount of warm water in the equatorial
and tropical areas. So, more number of cyclones, more severe cyclones and it may even
increase the height of the Hadley cell.

Why? If the areas are warmer, then we will have larger sized convection currents in the
atmosphere, that would increase the size of the Hadley cell. So, we will have changes in the
atmosphere as well. And higher temperatures in these areas will result in more water vapor in
the air, which is a greenhouse gas.

569
So, what is happening, if the thermohaline circulation stops because of global warming, in
that case, in the equatorial areas, we will have more amount of heat, more amount of heat will
result in more amount of water vapor in the air, which would result in trapping of even more
amount of energy. So that will be a positive feedback.

(Refer Slide Time: 40:09)

So essentially, what happens is that because of global warming, we will have warmer poles.
Warmer poles will result in reduced thermohaline circulation that is weakening of the
thermohaline circulation and warmer poles will also result in the melting of ice caps, which
would reduce the albedo. Now albedo refers to the reflectance of a surface. When we look at
white-coloured ice it reflects most of the heat.

Now when this ice melts, the areas will become covered with water and water has a much
lesser albedo as compared to ice. So, this water will then absorb more amount of sunlight as
compared to ice. And when more amount of sunlight is absorbed, in that case, the poles will
become even warmer. So, with reduced albedo, we will have an even warmer pole, which
will further lead to more amount of melting of ice, further reducing the albedo, which will
further warm the poles.

So, this is a positive feedback. If there is global warming, the poles will become warmer and
warmer with time. Another thing that will happen in the tropics is that global warming
because of reduced thermohaline circulation will result in warmer equator and tropics.

Directly as well global warming will result in warmer equator and tropics, which would result
in more amount of water vapor in the air, which would then further enhance the global

570
warming. So, what we are observing here is that if you have global warming, then up to a
certain level, you are protected by the global thermohaline circulation. But after a level what
will happen is that it will become a positive feedback.

And once it becomes a positive feedback, it will be next to impossible for us to reverse the
process. So when we talk about the global community, setting a threshold or setting a limit to
the amount of warming that is tolerable, this is what we are talking about. If warming
continues beyond a level, we will find a large destruction of biodiversity. And perhaps we
will reach a stage where we will have no longer any control to bring the system back to
normal because of the positive feedbacks.

(Refer Slide Time: 42:42)

Another movement of the ocean water is upwelling. Now upwelling is the movement of
waters from down below to upper areas. And this typically happens because of winds. So,
when winds push the surface water away from a location, the deep water rises to fill its space,
and this is known as upwelling. And opposite process called downwelling also happens if the
winds are concentrating surface waters into an area.

So where will those waters go? They will move to the sides or they will go down and those
locations will be known as downwelling locations. Now upwelling brings cold nutrient rich
water to the surface, which increases biological productivity, creating rich fishing grounds.

571
(Refer Slide Time: 43:35)

So, this is what happens in the case upwelling you have a vent that is pushing water away
from this area. And when the water is being pushed away, you have a void that gets created
here and this void is filled by water that rushing from the bottom to the top and this
movement of water, it will be further, further and further enhanced if we have a continuous
movement of when and this will become an upwelling location.

(Refer Slide Time: 44:06)

So, essentially when you have these surface winds that are pushing water away you have a
movement of the cool nutrient rich water upwards and because it is nutrient rich, so, it will
support a large number of planktons which will in turn support a large population of fishes.

572
(Refer Slide Time: 44:26)

And so, we have these major upwelling sites which are also very rich fishing grounds. So,
this is a very important place.

(Refer Slide Time: 44:35)

Yet another movement is tides. Tides are long period waves that move through the oceans in
response to the forces exerted by the Moon and the Sun. So, just like waves, the tides are also
waves, but they are long period waves, they are slow, they have very long time periods. They
are observed through rise and fall in the sea surface, the sea is the highest at high tide and it is
the lowest and the low tide.

573
The difference between the sea surface level during high tide and low tide is known as the
tidal range and tides are accompanied by a horizontal movement of water, the incoming tide
has a flood current and the outgoing tide has an ebb current.

(Refer Slide Time: 45:29)

What does that mean? It means that when the sea surface level is rising during a high tide, we
also have a horizontal movement of water in the form of flood current. So, this is being
shown here in the form of the movement of this seaweed. So, during the high tide the
seaweed will move from this area towards the shore. On the other hand, when we have a low
tide the water levels are receding down and in this case there is an ebb current which pushes
the seaweed away from the shore. So, these are the flood and the ebb currents.

(Refer Slide Time: 46:09)

574
How are tides formed? Tides are formed through the interaction of gravitational forces of the
Sun and the Moon together with the inertia of water. So, tides are occurring because the Sun
and the Moon are attracting the water towards them. But water also has an inertia it does not
want to move because it has a mass and so, it will resist this attraction and the interplay of
both of these will result in the formation of a tide a long period wave that will move across
the oceans.

At the near side, that is at the side where the water is close to the Moon or the Sun. So, at the
near side, the water is pulled more towards the Moon or the Sun resulting in a tidal bulge.

(Refer Slide Time: 47:02)

575
What we are saying here is that if this is the Earth, this is the Moon and here the sea level is
greatly exaggerated to allow for understanding. So, in this portion in the near side, we get a
tidal bulge due to gravity. So, the Moon is attracting the water and so, we get this bulge.

At the far side the gravitational attraction is less and the inertia exceeds the gravitational
force which forms a bulge. So, here is well we get a bulge and this bulge is not because of
gravity it is because of the inertia. So, essentially we can say that this water is not moving the
amount of gravitational attraction here is less and it will it is even lesser than the amount of
gravitational attraction on the Earth.

So essentially, the water remains here because of inertia the Earth moves and so we get a tidal
bulge here as well. And at other locations, the gravitational pull is somewhat balanced by the
inertia not completely. So, we do get a tide in other locations but it is not as high. Thus, we
get two bulges by the Moon and two bulges by the Sun and the interaction between these
bulges results in spring and neap tides meaning that if the Sun is resulting in a high tide, the
Moon is also resulting in a high tide, so both of these impacts will add together to make an
even higher tide.

Similarly, if both Sun and the Moon are making a low tide, then we will have an even lower
tide. Whereas if one of them is making the high tide and the other is making a low tide in that
case the effects will cancel out somewhat and so, we will not have that high or that low tide.
So, both of, both these bulges interact and they result in spring and neap tides.

Now, the solar tide moves in a 24-hour cycle, because this is the period of rotation of the
Earth whereas, the lunar tide moves in a 24 hour and 15 minutes cycle because the Moon
when it is revolving around the Earth, this is the amount of time it takes when we also
considered the rotation of the Earth. And in each cycle we have two high tides and two low
tides.

576
(Refer Slide Time: 49:34)

So, this is how it will look like. Now, in this case, the yellow colour shows the solar tides and
the pink colour shows the lunar tides. Now, when the Moon and the Sun are on one side, so,
the Earth the Moon and the Sun they form a straight line. So, in this case here we are getting
a high tide and the height is very high because both of these impacts are adding together.
Similarly, on the side as well both impacts are adding together.

So, when you have both the Sun and the Moon on one side or the Sun and the Moon on
opposite sides, in both of these cases we get spring tides, in which case we get very high tides
and very low tides. On the other hand, if the Sun and the Moon and the Earth they make a 90-
degree angle, then we get a neap tide. So, these are not as high because the impacts are not
adding together. So, this is a neap tide and this is a neap tide.

577
(Refer Slide Time: 50:38)

Now, if we consider the amount of, force that is being applied by the Sun and the Moon, the
pull of the Moon is much greater than the Sun because the Moon is much more closer to the
Earth. Now the tidal generating force is given as it is proportional to mass divided by distance
to the power 3. So, the force of Sun divided by the force of Moon will be given by mass of
Sun divided by distance of the Sun, from the Earth. to the power 3, whole divided by mass of
Moon divided by distance from the Moon to the power of 3.

(Refer Slide Time: 51:23)

578
What we are seeing here, is that the force is equal to mass divided by, distance cube. So, the
force of Sun, divided by the force of Moon will be given by, the mass of Sun divided by
distance from Sun to the power 3, whole divided by, the mass of Moon divided by distance
from Moon to the power 3. So, this can be written as, mass of Sun divided by distance from
Sun to the power 3, multiplied by distance from Moon to the power 3 divided by the mass of
the Moon.

So, this is what we are writing here, mass of Sun divided by mass of Moon, mass of Sun
divided by mass of Moon, multiplied by distance from Moon divided by distance from Sun to
the power 3, distance from Moon divided by distance from Sun to the power 3. And putting
in the figures for the mass of Sun mass of Moon, distance of Earth from the Sun and distance
of Earth from the Moon, we get that force of Sun divided by force of Moon is 0.46 which
means that the tide generating force of the Sun is only 46 percent or roughly half of that of
the Moon.

And this also varies according to the relative position between the Sun, the Moon and the
Earth. Because here we are taking the average distance from the Moon and the Sun to the
Earth, but the actual distances will be different depending on the orbit of the Earth and the
Moon.

579
(Refer Slide Time: 53:24)

So, in this case, when we look at the orbits they are elliptical orbits. And if we consider the
orbit of the Moon around the Earth, we have a point which is known as perigee where the
Moon is closest to the Earth and we have a point known as apogee where the Moon is at the
greatest distance from the Earth.

Similarly, if we consider the orbit of the Earth around the Sun, we have point that is known as
perihelion, where the Earth is closest to the Sun and we also have a point called aphelion,
where the Earth is the most distant from the Sun. Typically, these points occur around 2 to 4
July and 2 to 4 January.

Now, in this case, if we have this configuration where the Earth is at the perihelion to the Sun
is having the high is exerting the largest amount of force, the Moon is at the perigee that
means that the Moon is also exerting the largest amount of force that is possible, we will have
exceptionally high tides. So, these will be exceptionally high spring tides.

580
(Refer Slide Time: 54:44)

So, this is about tides. Now, the passage of tidal bulges is further influenced by the position
of the continents that blocked the westward passage of the tidal bulges. So, when we have
these tidal waves that are moving, if there is a continent that comes in the way then the tidal
waves are not able to move, this creates a further level of variation.

So, this creates variations in the tidal patterns, there are 3 prominent tidal patterns,
semidiurnal tides, which means two high and two low in each day, each have roughly the
same height. Diurnal tides, which is one high and one low in each day, and mixed
semidiurnal tides, which is too high and too low in each day, but have different heights.

581
(Refer Slide Time: 55:31)

So, different locations on the Earth have different patterns, we have semidiurnal, diurnal and
mixed semidiurnal tides.

(Refer Slide Time: 55:39)

Another motion of the ocean water is in the form of waves. Now, when we have a wave that
is traveling, the particles of water only move up and down, they do not move in the direction
of the wave. Wave only transfers energy it does not transfer the mass.

582
(Refer Slide Time: 56:02)

And waves originate when ships or birds touch water and create a ripple or if there is an
Earthquake that creates a tsunami wave or when there is wind. Now, when you have wind the
friction between air and the water surface creates small ripples, which provide wind a surface
to push against which then form waves, which grow in size and height, reaching a maximum
size when their speeds match the speed of the wind, and especially in areas that are not
interrupted by land.

(Refer Slide Time: 56:38)

583
So, if we look at a global view of the wave height, we will find the largest or the highest
waves in these areas, where you do not have any landmass for a very long distance. So that is
about the movement of waters in the next lecture, we shall explore the hydrological cycle.
That is all for today. Thank you for your attention. Jai Hind!

584
 Conservation Geography
Dr. Ankur Awadhiya, IFS
Indian Forest Service
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Module - 5
Hydrosphere
Lecture - 15
Hydrological cycle
(Refer Slide Time: 0:16)

Namaste! We carry forward our discussion on the hydrosphere and in this lecture we shall
have a look at the hydrological cycle or the water cycle, now we have seen before that the
Earth is a watery planet, a large portion of the Earth as much as around 70 percent of it is
covered with water bodies including seas and oceans, now we also have water on the surface,
above the surface and below the surface of the Earth.

585
So we are talking about things such as the water fraction that is there in the atmosphere and
the water fraction that is there in the form of groundwater as well, plus we also have a lot of
water that is there in the living organisms, that is water in the biosphere, now all of this water
keeps on moving from one portion to another portion and this movement occurs through a
cycle that is known as the water cycle or the hydrological cycle.

(Refer Slide Time: 1:17)

So we can define the hydrological cycle as the continuous movement of water on, above and
below the surface of the Earth. So the water cycle is a continuous moment of water, the water
cycle does not pause, the water cycle does not stop, the water cycle goes on and on, so it is a
continuous process, it is a continuous movement of water. Where? On, above and below the
surface of the Earth.

586
So in short this is the hydrological cycle we have water in different water bodies on the
surface of the planet say seas, oceans, ponds, lakes and so on, now this water on getting
heated with the heat of the Sun it gets evaporated, so evaporation is the process in which this
liquid water converts into water vapor, now once it has converted into water vapor it has
reached into the atmosphere, so it is now a part of the atmosphere.

Now in the atmosphere it can move from one place to another place with the winds so it
moves up using convectional currents and then it moves also through advection and when it
cools down it condenses, when it condenses it forms structures such as the clouds but there
are also a number of other structures such as fog, mist, haze and so on.

Now in these clouds, these clouds can also move with the winds and later on when the water
droplets in the clouds they coalesce together, they increase in size they become too heavy too
heavy to remain suspended and in that case they come down as precipitation that is rain.

So we can have precipitation in the form of rainfall, in the form of snowfall, in the form of
hailstones and so on and because the clouds can also move together with the winds we can
have this precipitation over the water bodies or we can have this precipitation over land, now
when the water is there on the land it starts to move according to the gradient of the land,
according to the slope of the land because of gravity.

Now this water movement is known as runoff, so some portion of water will run off to these
bodies which are the oceans and the seas, some portion may stand accumulated in the Earth
and these accumulated bodies are in the form of lakes and ponds, a fraction of water that has
fallen on the ground also is seeped into the Earth so it becomes a part of the ground water.

The water in the ground can be taken up by plants and these plants will then release this water
into the atmosphere through a process that is known as transpiration. Or this water that has
entered into the ground it can come out it can join the surface runoff or it can directly drain
itself into the seas and the oceans.

So essentially if you take water at any point, if you take water in the clouds or if you take the
water in the oceans we can look at a complete cycle so water starts here, it completes a cycle
and it comes back here, so this is the hydrological cycle.

587
(Refer Slide Time: 4:41)

And the hydrological cycle moves water through all the different reservoirs of water on the
planet, so we saw that the oceans are the largest reservoir around 97.25 percent of water is
there in the oceans then we have ice and snow, groundwater, lakes, soil moisture,
atmosphere, rivers and stream and biological water.

So the water cycle is moving water through all of these reservoirs, now because some
reservoirs hold water in the form of solid, some other reservoirs hold water in the form of
liquid and some other reservoirs have water in the form of gases, so we have different
processes that take place to move this water from one reservoir to another reservoir. So we
can have the process of evaporation, condensation, precipitation, sublimation and so on.

(Refer Slide Time: 5:36)

588
So in the oceans the major movement or the major process is evaporation, so water leaves the
oceans in a majority in the form of evaporation, in the ice and snow components we have
snow melt and sublimation, so snow melt is the conversion of solid ice into liquid water and
sublimation is the conversion of solid ice directly into water vapor or the gaseous form.

So the water leaves this component through snow melt and sublimation, water leaves the
groundwater in the form of groundwater discharge springs or it may directly be released into
the oceans.

Water leaves the surface runoff component in the form of stream flow in which case it moves
into the oceans or it moves in the form of storage infiltration in which case it moves into
groundwater and water leaves the atmospheric component through condensation and
precipitation and all of this movement is being powered by solar energy aided by gravity.

(Refer Slide Time: 6:46)

589
So let us now have a look at the major contributing physical processes, we have evaporation
which is change in the physical state of water from liquid to gas using energy from heat aided
by temperature, wind, pressure differences and so on, so evaporation is the conversion of
water from liquid to gas. Now when water has to convert from liquid to gas it requires energy
which is the latent heat of evaporation or the latent heat of boiling, so in this case this heat is
taken from the surroundings.

The major source of this heat is the Sun but we also have sources such as the geothermal
energy or the heat from the Earth that can also play a role in evaporating the water and
evaporation is aided by things such as wind movement. So if we have winds then the amount
of evaporation increases, it is aided by temperatures, so when temperature increases the air
can hold a larger quantity of water vapor and so more amount of evaporation takes place, it is
aided by pressure differences so if the pressure in an area lowers then water will convert into
water vapor to take the space; so these are the various aiding mechanisms for evaporation.

Then we have transpiration, transpiration is the transfer of water from plants into the
atmosphere through the leaf openings, now these leaf openings are known as stomata they are
there in the leaves mostly in the lower surface of the leaf and through the process of
transpiration water is converted into water vapor and released into the atmosphere and why
do plants need to perform transpiration it is there to create a pressure gradient so that the
plants are able to suck up water from the ground.

Now the water that is coming from the ground into the plants will also be carrying a number
of minerals which are used as nutrients so basically what it means is that if you have a plant
and here you have the root system so the water that is there in the ground is taken up by these

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roots primarily through very small structures that are known as root hairs now root hairs are
there to increase the surface that is available to gather water, so these are the root hairs.

Now when water moves into these roots then it also carries with it the minerals or different
salts that are present in the soil, so these salts act as nutrients so through this process the
nutrients are moving into the plants and to ensure that water keeps moving into the plants this
water after it is taken up through the roots it is moving through the stem, it goes into the
leaves and from here it is lost into the atmosphere in the form of water vapor.

Now this loss of water, if this loss of water did not happen then where would all of this water
go, the plants have a limited capacity to hold water and if that capacity is exceeded then this
process would stop and in that case the plants will not be able to get their nutrients. At the
same time plants also require water to perform photosynthesis, so if we write the equation of
photosynthesis it goes like this 6 CO 2 plus 6 H2O in the presence of light and in the presence
of chlorophyll, it gives C6H12O6 which is glucose plus 6 oxygen.

So essentially plants are using up carbon dioxide and they are using up water, so water is also
one of the reagents to perform photosynthesis, they require light and they require chlorophyll
and when all of these are together then in the plants glucose will get generated, glucose is a
carbohydrate, so carbo refers to the carbon portion so it has carbon and hydrate means that it
has water so basically you can write C6H12O6 also as (CH2O) X 6.

So in this case it has carbon and it has water so it is a carbohydrate and it will also release
oxygen and we have observed before that this release of oxygen is what led to the great
oxygenation event that changed the composition of the atmosphere, so this is where the
oxygen in the atmosphere comes from so plants need to perform transpiration to get water
and the nutrients from the soil.

So this is a process in which water in liquid form which was present in the ground is
converted into water vapor and released into the atmosphere through leaf openings that are
known as stomata.

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(Refer Slide Time: 12:36)

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Then we have sublimation, sublimation is change in the physical state of water from solid to
gas using energy from heat so in the process of sublimation water does not convert from solid
to liquid and then move into gas, water directly moves from a solid state into a gaseous state.
So essentially when we talk about sublimation if you have a block of ice then the water that is
there in this ice will directly get converted into water vapor and this process is known as
sublimation.

Another process is advection, advection is forced movement of water together with the winds
so it is movement of water through the atmosphere by means of wind, so when you have
wind movement the water that is there in the air in the form of water vapor that also moves,
so this is the process of advection.

Then we have condensation, condensation is the opposite of evaporation so in condensation it

is a change in the physical state of water from gas to liquid by release of energy, so in the
case of evaporation it required energy, in the case of condensation it releases energy often
forming things such as clouds, fog, mist, haze, etc. This often occurs during cooling because
you have to release energy in the form of heat, so this release of energy will happen in a cool
surrounding.

So this often occurs during cooling as the ability of air to hold moisture is dependent on the
temperature and at the dew point the air becomes saturated with water, what does that mean
the air has a limited capacity to hold moisture now this capacity to hold moisture it is
dependent on the temperature if you heat up the air then it will be able to hold a larger
quantity of water vapor if air cools down then it will be able to hold a smaller quantity of
water vapor.

Now dew point is the point at which the air is 100 percent saturated with water so you take
air at a higher temperature, add moisture to it and then you reduce the temperature of the air
so at some point you will have air that is 100 percent saturated that is the amount of moisture
that is present is equal to the capacity of air to hold moisture and beyond this point the
moisture has to be lost from the air because it does not have any further capacity to hold this
moisture.

So this loss of moisture will happen through the process of condensation so in condensation
this moisture in the form of water vapor will be converted into liquid water and it will be shed
out of the air and this happens when the temperature is at the dew point or below the dew
point.

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Condensation occurs around hygroscopic condensation nuclei such as salt particles, dust
particles, smoke etc. So when condensation is happening it has to leave water somewhere and
typically the water is left around the hygroscopic particles such as dust or salt so these are
known as condensation nuclei because when condensation occurs it is around these particles
that the water will condense in the form of a liquid.

So these act as nuclei to start the condensation process, if you do not have these nuclei then
perhaps the air would not find a mechanism to release the water so it will become super
saturated that is holding water above its capacity and as soon as it gets any impurity or it gets
any surface or which it can shed the water immediately it will shed the water so these
particles are known as condensation nuclei.

(Refer Slide Time: 16:52)

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Another process is deposition, now deposition is the opposite of sublimation, in sublimation
water converted from solid to gas without going through a liquid phase, similarly in the
process of deposition water moves from gas to solid without going through the liquid phase,
so deposition is the change in the physical state of water from gas to solid by release of
energy and forming ice.

Then we have precipitation which is falling off condensed water in liquid or solid form to the
ground by means of rainfall, snowfall, hail, sleet, etc. So the falling of the condensed water
either in liquid form such as rainfall or in a solid form such as snowfall or hailstones or a
mixture such as sleet, now sleet is a mixture of water and snow so this condensed water in the
form of solid or liquid or a mixture it falls to the ground by means of this process that is
known as precipitation, so precipitation means rainfall, snowfall, falling of hailstones, falling
off sleet and so on.

Next we have interception which is interruption in the movement of water to streams by

vegetal cover, depression storage in puddles, land formation, rails and furrows, etc. Now
interception is the interruption in the movement of water to the streams, so essentially what
happens is that when you have rainfall the water that falls down to the Earth it tends to move
towards the streams and with the streams it will tend to move towards the oceans. Now
interception is the interruption of this process, that is in the process of interception the water
is interrupted from moving into the streams and into the oceans.

Now how can we have these interruptions, suppose water is moving, so suppose this is a land
formation and you have water that is flowing like this, now in this case at this spot suppose
there is a small depression here so in this case the water will get accumulated here, some
amount of water gets accumulated and so this water is now not directly moving into the
streams, this is an interruption in the flow of this water so this is interception.

Another way is in the form of trees so when you have a tree the water that was falling down
in the form of rain water, it now does not directly reach into the ground, so the trees stop this
movement of water and this water gets collected in these canopies, so this is the tree canopy
which is the leaves and the branches, so these leaves and the branches they hold the water and
after sometime this water will start to move through the bark and through the stem of this tree
in a process that is known as stem flow. And then it will reach the ground.

Now if the water had directly fallen on the ground it would have fallen at a very high speed,
so in that case the rain water would have done a lot of erosion and then it would have swiftly

595
moved into the nearby streams. But what do these trees do, these trees stop that movement of
water they interrupt the water from directly hitting the ground, slowing it down and so the
amount of erosion becomes less and the soil gets protected.

And at the same time when this water moves down, it moves through the stems of these trees
so if you stand under a tree during a rain you will find that you are not getting hit directly by
the rainwater but if you touch the stem of the tree you will find that it is damp it is wet
because water is moving through the surface of the stem into the ground.

And typically the roots in these locations they are able to dig into the soil so when this water
comes here now this water will not move in the form of a surface flow this will not happen
but it will slowly get absorbed into the soil, so it will become a part of the ground water and
so in this way the water is not moving into the streams in the form of surface runoff but it is
getting into the ground so this is the importance of interception.

Now after in interception we also have infiltration, infiltration is the movement of water from
the ground surface into the ground to form soil moisture or ground water, so after this
interception when the water is moving into the ground, this is infiltration, once the water has
entered into the ground there will be percolation, percolation is the vertical movement of
water through rocks and soil under the influence of gravity. So once this water has entered
into the soil here, in the form of infiltration, now it is moving down under the influence of
gravity and this is percolation.

(Refer Slide Time: 22:34)

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Next we have runoff which is flow from a drainage basin in the form of streams including
surface runoff, subsurface runoff and groundwater runoff, so essentially when we talk about
the movement of water in the streams then we are talking about a runoff, now this runoff can
occur on the surface so when rain falls on the ground it moves through various channels it
enters into a stream and then it begins to move out towards the oceans or towards an inland
lake.

Now these movements are known as surface runoffs, we can also have subsurface runoffs and
we can also have a ground water runoff, now groundwater runoff refers to a situation where
the groundwater is moving into the streams so essentially what is happening is that it is an
opposite process to that of infiltration.

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So you have this, so suppose this is the land and here you have a stream say a river but
suppose the groundwater is at this level so in that case some amount of water will begin to
flow from the groundwater into the streams and then it will begin to move away from this
drainage basin, so this is known as a ground water runoff.

Then we also have storage which is accumulation of water in different reservoirs for different
residence times where residence time is the average time a water molecule will spend in a
reservoir which varies from around 9 days in the atmosphere to around 20000 years in the
Antarctic ice caps. So this is the average time a water molecule will spend in a reservoir.

Now we have talked about different reservoirs such as oceans or atmosphere or ice caps or
groundwater and when we talk about the residence time what is the average time that a water
molecule will spend in the reservoir once it have, it has entered into this reservoir, so the
residence time can be as low as 9 days in the atmosphere.

So on an average a water molecule stays in the atmosphere for only 9 days after which it gets
condensed or it gets precipitated or deposited somewhere to around 20000 years in the
Antarctic ice caps. So if a water molecule has entered into the Antarctic ice caps it can expect
to stay there for around 20000 years.

(Refer Slide Time: 25:13)

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Now apart from the major processes we also have certain minor contributing physical
processes such as movement of water into the planet in the subduction zones, now you will
remember that a subduction zone is an area where two plates are colliding and one of the
plates is moving below another plate, so this is a region of convergence, now in this
convergence typically if you have a convergence of say an oceanic plate with a continental
plate then the oceanic plate will move down and when it moves down the water that was here
in this plate it is also moving down.

So this is a process through which water from the crust is moving into or towards the mantle
so this is a minor contributing physical process or another process is the release of water
vapor through volcanic activity and we had observed here that in most of the cases we find
volcanoes in this region which spew out this water in the form of water vapor, so this is
another activity that is happening.

Then we have loss of water from the Earth into the outer space so when water is moving up
in the atmosphere a part of it can also get lost into the space or some water may enter into the
atmosphere through things like icy comets and meteors so these processes also happen but by
and large when we talk about the hydrological cycle these are very minor processes, so very
small amount of water is moving through these mechanisms but it is important to note that
these mechanisms also do exist.

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(Refer Slide Time: 27:07)

Now when we talk about condensation, condensation can happen in a number of forms so we
can have condensation in the form of clouds, in the form of dew, in the form of haze, in the
form of mist and a number of ways, so let us now explore some forms of condensation, the
first one is dew. Dew is the deposition of moisture in the form of water droplets on cooler
surfaces of objects such as grass blades and you will typically observe dew formation in the
winter months.

So if you go out early morning in a winter month you will find that on the cooler surfaces
such as grass or such as say the bodies of vehicles you will find very small droplets of water,
now in this case because these surfaces are cold the air that is near these surfaces it crosses
the dew point at which point it becomes super saturated and it begins to shed out the moisture

600
in the form of liquid water so that is dew. So typically you will observe dew in the case of
early mornings especially in the winter months on things such as grass blades.

(Refer Slide Time: 28:27)

Another is frost, frost is the deposition of moisture in the form of ice crystals on cold surfaces
of objects when the dew point is below the freezing point, now in this case the water directly
gets deposited in the form of ice crystals so this is how a frost looks like. So you will find that
you have ice deposits on the soil and this typically happens when the dew point is so less or is
at a so little temperature that it is less than the freezing point of water so the air is able to hold
the moisture till its temperature goes below the freezing point of water and so the water is
deposited in the form of ice crystals.

601
(Refer Slide Time: 29:15)

Next we have fog, mist and haze which is condensation of water vapor near the ground
surface and this typically happens very similar to the formation of clouds so in this case the
water condenses in the dust particles or say pollen grains or smoke particles very near to the
ground surface so you have a cloud that gets formed near the ground and depending on the
visibility, if the visibility is less than 1 kilometer we call it a fog, if visibility is between 1 to 2
kilometers we call it a mist, if visibility is between 2 to 5 kilometers we call it a haze.

So this is condensation of water vapor near the ground surface but not on the ground surface
so this is what a fog looks like, so as you can observe these trees that are at a far off distance
they are not very visible.

602
(Refer Slide Time: 30:08)

603
Next we have clouds which is condensation of water vapor at high elevations in the
atmosphere and you can have different kinds of clouds. So we have cirrus clouds which are
high clouds at a height of 8 to 12 kilometers with a wispy appearance; cumulus is medium
low clouds 4 to 7 kilometers with a cotton ball like appearance; stratus, stratus means a layer
so it is a layer of clouds that covers the whole of the sky or a large portion of the sky and you
also have nimbus which is dark gray to black colored clouds typically the clouds that bring
rain.

So this is if we look at the cloud cover of the planet this is what it looks like so you can
observe that we have a lot of clouds in the atmosphere and these are the different kinds of
clouds so you have cirrus clouds so these are very high clouds and they look like a horse's tail
so they have a wispy appearance. Then you have cumulus clouds they look like cotton balls,
they are at a middle altitude, you have stratus clouds which cover the whole of the sky and
you have nimbus clouds which have these black spots and which typically bring rains.

Now nimbus can be in the form of cumulonimbus so this has a cottony appearance but it is
black or it can be stratonimbus which is covering the whole of the sky but it is dark gray or
black in color and bringing rains and so on.

(Refer Slide Time: 31:46)

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605
And when we talk about rain there are different kinds of rains, we have conventional rainfall
which is common on hot days or and near the equator often accompanied by thunder and
lightning, in the case of convectional rainfall what happens is that the water that gets heated
up gets converted into water vapor, it moves up through the convectional currents that gets
set up, now what we are talking about is that once you have a surface probably the surface
also has some amount of water or some amount of moisture.

Now when you have the Sun and the land is getting heated up now in that case convectional
currents are set up which means that the air here is warmer and so it becomes less dense and
it rises, so you have a moment of air upwards and along with this air the water vapor also
moves up.

Now we know that as we move up the temperature reduces so here you have a low
temperature and in this low temperature this water vapor condenses when it condenses it
forms clouds in this area and when the clouds get formed and when you have a lot of
moisture that is moving into the clouds the air becomes super saturated and then it starts to
condense here.

So essentially in the morning times and in the afternoons the air is getting heated up it is
moving upwards it is taking the moisture upwards but then towards the evenings when it is
becoming a bit cooler when the Sun is setting in at that time the clouds will begin to give out
rain and so you will have a very intense amount of rainfall often accompanied by thunder and
lightning so that is convectional rainfall it is powered by the convection currents powered by
the Sun and you have moisture that is moving up then when it moves up the temperature
reduces it forms clouds and then you have a precipitation. And often this convectional rainfall
is a very intense rainfall so here in this picture you can see that there is a very intense amount
of rainfall that is occurring.

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(Refer Slide Time: 34:12)

607
Another rainfall is the orographic rainfall or the relief rainfall, now we had observed this term
orogenesis which means mountain building, oros is mountain so orographic rainfall is that
rainfall that has got to do something with the mountains or something with the relief, now in
this case the rainfall is common near the mountains and what happens is when you have a
wind that is blowing towards the mountains when it reaches the mountains it starts to move
upwards following the slope of this mountain.

And when the air moves upwards again you have a cooling because of this cooling there is a
cloud formation and there is rainfall, when the air moves on the other side it typically gets
warmed and so you will have a heavy rainfall on this portion but not any rainfall in this
portion so if this is the wind direction, if you have a mountain like this and if the wind moves
in this direction you will have an upward movement of the moisture here you will find
tremendous amounts of clouds and you will have heavy rain in this side but when the air is
moving down on the other side of the mountain it gets warmed.

And when it gets warm there is no further rainfall on this side, now the left side that is facing
the winds is known as the windward side and the opposite side is known as the leeward side
so the orographic rainfall is characterized by heavy rainfall on one side that is the windward
side which faces the winds and very little rainfall on the other side which is the leeward side,
so this is the orographic rainfall.

(Refer Slide Time: 36:06)

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Third we also have cyclonic rainfall that occurs with the cyclones and we had observed that
in the case of cyclones you have a very rapid movement of air towards a low pressure center
and then the air moves up the air also rotates because of the Coriolis force and when the air is
moving up you get a tremendous amount of rainfall, now this rainfall is only associated with
the cyclones and so this is known as the cyclonic rainfall, so these are the three major rain
types you have convectional rainfall, orographic rainfall and cyclonic rainfall.

(Refer Slide Time: 36:41)

So what is the importance of the hydrological cycle, well it provides fresh water to different
organisms and fresh water is needed for the survival of different organisms. Now all the
organisms are not living close to the larger size water bodies, if we did not have the water
cycle then where would they get the water from? Because of the hydrological cycle the water

609
from the oceans is being moved into the land areas and so the hydrological cycle in a way
sustains all the life on this planet or most of the life in this planet.

There is a moment of heat on this planet because of the hydrological cycle, why, because in
the warmer areas when there is evaporation the water gets converted into water vapor taking
up the heat and then when it moves with the wind to other areas and when it cools down and
it condenses then there is a release of heat so in a way the heat from the very hot areas is
being taken to other areas primarily through the latent heat of vaporization.

Now latent heat of vaporization of water is very large and so the hydrological cycle moves a
large amount of heat from hot areas to cooler areas, so this plays a role in the heat budget as
well. It plays a role on the gradation of the planet because when you have water that is moved
to the land areas this water when it begins to flow in the form of say rivers or rivulets or
streams it will perform erosion, it will also perform certain amount of deposition on the sides
of the rivers and also near the deltas.

So in a way it is playing a role in the gradation of the planet, it is a very important

geomorphological agent, so this is another importance of the hydrological cycle, it plays a
role in the in influencing the gradation of the planet by creating geomorphological agents in
the form of water movement.

Another importance is that it creates a variety of climate patterns and habitats through type,
distribution and seasonality of precipitation. Type meaning that whether it is in the form of
rains or it is in the form of snow so if you have snowfall there will be a very different habitat
that gets created full of ice and snow if there is rainfall it is a very different kind of habitat.

Distribution that is which places get this rainfall and in what amount, so certain areas that
have a very heavy amount of rainfall they will have a very different climate, say tropical
forest or equatorial rainforest, they get a heavy amount of rainfall and those areas that do not
get a large amount of rainfall those areas that get a very scanty amount of rainfall they
become deserts and so the distribution of rainfall means that certain areas become equatorial
rainforest and certain other areas become deserts which are very different habitats.

And seasonality of precipitation, so in certain areas you have lots of rainfall in a very short
period of time which results in a flood-like situation, in other areas the rainfall is distributed
over a very large number of months so the seasonality is different and in those areas you do
not get that much amount of floods.

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Now areas that are flooded are a very different habitat, areas like marshes and the areas that
do not receive floods are a very different habitat and so the type, distribution and seasonality
of precipitation creates various forms of habitats, more the number of habitats, more will be
the biodiversity, so the hydrological cycle plays a very big role in terms of creating different
habitats and sustaining different kinds of biodiversity, so that is another importance.

(Refer Slide Time: 40:48)

If you look at the distribution of total rainfall we will find that areas that are near the equator
they get a very heavy amount of rainfall mostly convectional rainfall and otherwise you have
certain areas that get more amount of rainfall in certain areas that get less amount of rainfall
so this is the distribution of total rainfall on this planet, these areas that get a heavy amount of
rainfall we have the equatorial rainforests here.

So in South America, in Africa, in Southeast Asia we have a very heavy amount of rainfall
and in those areas where we get less amount of rainfall we have the deserts, so this is the
Sahara desert, this is the Arabian desert, this is the Thar desert, so the distribution of rainfall
creates different habitats.

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(Refer Slide Time: 41:37)

But then these days the humans are also playing a big role in influencing, impacting and
disrupting the hydrological cycle, now the hydrological cycle naturally is dependent on
processes like evaporation and transpiration, infiltration, percolation but now we humans are
changing these, so what are we doing, there is an excessive usage of water especially surface
and groundwater because we are overpopulated and there is a high intensity of resource use.

Now because of that a number of our water bodies are now drying up, the areas that were
known for the lakes now no longer have those lakes because all that water has been used up.
In certain cases, all that water has been drained out to make way for things like buildings so
you will often find wetlands and ponds that are drained out, filled up with Earth and then a
high rise building gets created, constructed there.

612
So this is one impact that we are having on the hydrological cycle, if we do not have the
wetlands then the amount of groundwater will go down because wetlands act as locations
where a large amount of infiltration of rainfall, infiltration of surface water happens. Then we
also have an impact on infiltration and percolation through construction of impervious
surfaces such as concrete and tar.

Now in a natural condition most of the ground would be just covered with grasses and grasses
aid the infiltration of water by creating hindrances to the water movement so essentially the
water that falls in the form of rain water it is not able to move that fast because all these
grasses will be stopping that water and essentially when we say groundwater recharge it
implies only three things; if the water is running you have to make it to walk, if the water is
walking then you have to make it to stand and once the water is standing it will have nowhere
else to go it will go down.

Now the plants, the trees, the grasses what do they do? They aid in all these processes, they
reduce the speed of water and they have a surface that permits this water to move into the
groundwater reservoir but what are we doing, we are removing all of these grasses and we are
covering this whole area with a concrete surface, now if you have a concrete surface or say a
tar surface then this water has nowhere else to go it will only flow down, there will be
absolutely no infiltration.

Now with the development of civilization now we have routes that are practically
everywhere, a large portion of the Earth is now covered with our buildings and all of that is
hindering the flow of water into the groundwater reservoir so that is another impact that we
humans are having on the hydrological cycle, we are stopping the flow of water through
dams, converting the lotic habitats into lentic habitats.

Now lotic habitats are those habitats where the water is moving, lentic habitats are those
habitats where the water is standing, so we are stopping the flow of water now when we talk
about the hydrological cycle the water that was falling on the ground it was moving towards
the oceans through the streams, through the rivers, now when we stop that water what
happens is we create an artificial wetland, now this artificial wetland may be in a location that
is having impervious rocks.

So in that case this wetland will not be aiding in the groundwater recharge but on the other
hand what it will do is that the sediments that were being moved by the rivers, the salts that
were being moved by the rivers, they are now stopping, they are now getting accumulated

613
and that will lead to environmental consequences, so we are not just over utilizing water, we
are not just hindering the movement of water into the groundwater reservoir but even the
water that is moving into the oceans we are stopping that as well.

A large number of deltas are now shrinking because these sediments that were being brought
by the rivers they are now getting clogged up in the dams so we are now facing a situation
where a large number of our deltas are shrinking, they are disappearing. Then we are doing
deforestation and at times afforestation but being done with exotic species, those species that
are not suited for that area now when we do deforestation when we cut away the trees, then
we are impacting the hydrological cycle not only because the trees perform a vital role of
transpiration but also because the trees hold up the water and aid in the groundwater recharge.

So in a number of cases we are cutting up the trees making way for say agricultural fields or
habitations, so we cut up these trees we make a road or we set up buildings or in certain cases
we change the species composition, so we remove those species that are natively suited to
that habitat and we plant trees brought from outside.

Now these trees that are being brought from outside they might not be that well suited to the
habitat, so essentially it is possible that they take out a large amount of groundwater and
release it into the air which will lead to drying up of lands because they are not native
species, they have not evolved to suit themselves to this particular habitat, so this is another
impact that we are having.

Pollution, especially industrial pollution, agricultural pollution, vehicular pollution; so all of

these pollutants that we are generating a large portion of it is getting into our water bodies if
you look at the plastic bags that people throw out a large portion of it makes its way into the
water bodies it makes its way into the rivers and ultimately into the oceans, not only does it
disrupt the animal life there because a large number of animals can get trapped in these
plastics, they eat up these plastics that choke their elementary canals but at the same time it is
also polluting by releasing a large number of chemicals into these water bodies, so this is
another impact.

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(Refer Slide Time: 48:30)

Urbanization and creation of urban heat islands, so what is an urban heat island if you
consider a location where in a certain area you have a concentration of buildings and roads,
so these are large in numbers, but things such as trees or things like wetlands they are less in
number. If you look at our cities you will find this situation, so in the cities we have a large
number of buildings, we have a large number of roads and there is very little amount of trees
and wetlands because they have essentially been removed to make way for buildings and
roads.

Now when we talk about the energy from the Sun if you have trees there will be shade, if you
have wetlands they will moderate the climate, but when we talk about buildings with lots of
concrete and roads made out of either concrete or tar then these structures, the buildings and

615
the roads they absorb the heat, they retain the heat and in that case what happens is that these
areas become warmer than their surroundings.

So essentially if you look at these areas if we say make a temperature profile, the temperature
profile will look like this, so here we are plotting the temperature and the temperature in the
surroundings will be average but then the temperature here will be, will rise then it will fall
again here, so this now looks like an island on a temperature chart, so this is an urban heat
island, urban because it is being created through urbanization, heat because the temperatures
are high and island because this is an anomaly of high temperature that is surrounded by areas
that are having a lesser temperature.

Now when we create these urban heat islands we also disrupt the hydrological cycle, why,
because in these areas we are creating a situation where a lot of convection will happen
because these areas are getting heated up but because these areas have less amount of water
we are putting dry air upwards, at the same time when we talk about precipitation, when we
talk about condensation, condensation can only happen when the temperatures in the upper
atmosphere are low.

Now in this case we are adding up heat into the upper atmosphere as well, so this disrupts the
hydrological cycle, we will not have that much amount of rains as we were having before, so
this is another impact on the hydrological cycle, creation of the urban heat islands.

(Refer Slide Time: 51:30)

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Another impact is global warming and climate change that is causing the melting of glaciers
and changes in the climatic patterns, so through global warming what we are doing is that we
are changing the temperatures of the planet, the planet is going is becoming more and more
warmer, we are changing the wind patterns, we are changing the places where rainfall used to
happen, we are changing the type of rain, the type of precipitation, we are changing the
seasonality of precipitation, we are changing the distribution of precipitation.

So in effect what is happening is that we are getting more number of extreme climatic events,
we are pushing certain areas towards droughts, we are pushing certain areas towards floods
which is another disruption to the natural hydrological cycle, so if we look at the global
temperature anomalies we find that here the yellows and the reds represent an increase in
temperature and blues represent a decrease in temperature and if you look at the world map
will find that roughly every place is now yellow or red, except say a few batches here or a
few patches here, roughly all of the world is now heating up.

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(Refer Slide Time: 52:44)

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Now what kinds of impacts is it having, so this is an image of the Columbia glacier in Alaska
and this is a false color composite so this is not exactly the color that we are accustomed to
seeing, the true color composite would have shown a glacier in white color but this is a false
color composite which means that we are playing with the bands of the satellite imagery so as
to enable us to look at the phenomena more clearly.

So in this band combination it is easy to see things like the moraines. Now in this case this is
an image from 1986 and we find that this Columbia glacier it has a west branch, it has a main
branch, there is a medial moraine in between and this is the end of this glacier so this is a
pretty large size glacier, this scale is 5 kilometers so the width of the glacier is somewhere
around 3 kilometers in this area and it is getting ice and snow from all of these different
areas.

Now let us look at what we have done to it, so this is the image from 1986, this is the image
from 1987, so the major difference what we are observing here is in this location, so earlier
this was the terminus and we find very small number of ice chunks that are moving into the
ocean now the ice chunks are much more in number, by 1989 now the tip has shifted back, so
earlier we had started from a terminus at this point, so let us put the cursor here, now the
terminus is here so this is the image from 1989.

(Refer Slide Time: 54:28)

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This is 1995 and you can observe that now the glacier has shifted to this location, the glacier
is melting, the glacier is disappearing. Now remember that when we talked about the ice caps
in the case of Antarctic ice caps the water had a residence time of roughly 20000 years, even
in the case of the Alaskan glaciers the water has a residence time of several thousands of
years.

But now the water that was stored up that would have remained in that place for very long
period of time that is now melting up at a very fast pace, so this is another change that we are
bringing, so this is the image from 1995, 96, 97 and now you are observing that the ice is
changing its color because there is now a rapid amount of melting everywhere. Now the
melted water it creates pools, it creates small streams and so they look very different.

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(Refer Slide Time: 55:26)

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This is 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003. So we had when we began we had the terminus here,
now you have the terminus here so all of this portion is now gone.

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(Refer Slide Time: 55:42)

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2004, 5, 6, 8, 9, now both of these branches are now getting eaten up, 2010, 11, 13, now in 13
you find that now both of these branches are no longer connected they have melted away, 14,
15 and 16. This is the kind of impact that we are having on the system 2018, 2019. So this is
the rate at which we are losing the glaciers, this is the rate at which we are impacting the
hydrological cycle.

Now not only is this hydrological cycle being impacted just by the melting of the glaciers, but
what is happening with this melt water? This melt water is moving into the oceans, when it
moves into the oceans what does it do, you now have more amount of water in the oceans, so
the oceans are now overflowing, so essentially the areas that are close to the sea, to the sea or
the oceans essentially the coastal areas they are now getting inundated, there is a flooding.

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Now if you have a flooding in a town where will people go? We are essentially reducing the
amount of land that we have on this planet. At the same time when you look at ice, the ice has
a large amount of albedo, it reflects most of the heat back but water has a low albedo, so
global warming essentially increases global warming and if you do not do something urgently
probably it will be too late. So that is all for today, thank you for your attention. Jai Hind!

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