ABSTRACT
Ocean Bottom ................................................................... 152 3.2 Quantitative Assessment of Submarine Groundwater Discharge
to the World Ocean from Continents .......................................................... 155 3.3 The Role of Groundwater Flow in the Formation of a Salt Balance
and the Chemical Composition of Seas and Oceans .................................. 178 3.3.1 Computation of Total Salt Transfer with Groundwater Flow
to Seas and Oceans........................................................................... 179 3.3.2 Behavior of Chemical Elements in the Zone of
Mixing Groundwater and Seawater ................................................. 195 3.4 Influence of Submarine Sedimentation Water on the Water
and Salt Balance of Oceans ......................................................................... 199 3.5 Natural Regional and Global Regularities of Submarine Groundwater
Formation and Distribution .......................................................................... 211 3.6 Submarine Ground Discharge and Modern-Age Climatic Change............. 234
3.6.1 The Climate-Change Puzzle............................................................. 234 3.6.2 The Hydrologic Perspective in Relation to Climate Change .......... 236 3.6.3 Climate-Change Scenarios and Simulation Models ........................ 236 3.6.4 On Climate-Hydrologic Feedbacks and 2·CO2 Uncertainty ........... 238 3.6.5 A Steady-State Approach to SGD and TDS Response
to Climate Change ........................................................................... 241
Two types of groundwater can be determined on the floors of seas and oceans: water of silt sediments and water of consolidated rocks. Groundwater of the first type is closely connected with the history of the given sea basin, and especially with paleogeography of the Quaternary period. Solid compounds, being transferred to oceans from the land, deposit mainly in the shelf zone. The rate of sedimentation is great and equal to 9 sm/yr (Korotkov et al. 1980). In the deep-sea part of the ocean this value is 1-1.5 times lower. Silt water has the most variable composition in the shelf zone. At the first stage of clay deposit formation on the shelf, its wetness amounts to 80-120%. Sediment dehydration begins even at the first stage of diagenesis. Within the upper zone of 10-15 m, wetness decreases 2-3 times and density increases from 1.4-1.9 g/m3. Then wetness decreases slowly with depth. Squeezing of pore water back to the sea or forming sandy and gravel sediments begins at a depth of several meters and continues during the long-term geological history of sedimentary layer formation.
