Sea temperatures around Ieodo are rising rapidly. It was found to be more than twice as fast as the global average temperature increase.
A team led by Jeong Jin-yong at the Korea Institute of Ocean Science & Technology (KIOST) said on the 11th that, after analyzing 20 years of ocean and weather observations accumulated at the Ieodo Ocean Research Station, it proved that sea and air temperatures around Ieodo are rising more than twice as fast as the global average.
According to the dataset analyzed by the research team, the average temperature from the sea surface to a depth of 5 meters around Ieodo rose 0.55℃ over 10 years. During the same period, the global average sea surface (same basis) temperature rose 0.24℃.
In particular, on May the average sea temperature around the Ieodo station was 17℃, far exceeding the 20-year May average of 15℃.
The research team said, "This rapid warming could affect the overall marine ecosystem, including fish species distribution and fisheries resources."
The Ieodo station is Korea's first ocean observation facility, located about 150 kilometers southwest of Jeju Island in waters about 40 meters deep.
KIOST carried out this research with support from the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries' "Construction of advanced ocean science stations and convergence research in jurisdictional waters." The findings were published in Scientific Data, a sister journal of Nature and an international journal specializing in big data.