Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AFP) – A decrease in airborne dust and volcanic emissions has contributed to warming the North Atlantic Ocean in the past three decades, a study showed. About 70 percent of the Atlantic's warming since 1980, at an average per-decade rate of a half-degree Fahrenheit (a quarter-degree Celsius), was due to less dust blown from African dust storms or to volcanic eruptions, scientists wrote in the journal Science. "Volcanoes and dust storms are really important if you want to understand (climatic) changes over long periods of time," said the study's lead author Amato Evan, a researcher with the University of...