Carbon dioxide is lost from the ocean by calcium carbonate precipitation (-p), photosynthesis (-b) and gas evasion at the sea surface (-g). Among the most active sites are warm shallow seas. In this paper seasonal studies on the Great Bahama Bank relate these processes in an equation which takes into account the indirect effects of advection (a), evaporation (e), and eddy diffusion (d). Calcium carbonate precipitation is very seasonal and accounts for about half of the total losses. The delta sum CO2/deltaCa ratio is always about 1.87 on the bank. A high summer carbonate loss is inversely correlated with summer increases of chlorinity and temperature suggesting that CaCO3 is precipitated inorganically or biogenic production of CaCO3 is regulated by these parameters or both.

In order to allow full comparability with other ocean acidification data sets, the R package seacarb (Lavigne and Gattuso, 2011) was used to compute a complete and consistent set of carbonate system variables, as described by Nisumaa et al. (2010). In this dataset the original values were archived in addition with the recalculated parameters (see related PI).

Supplement to: Traganza, Eugene D (1967): Dynamics of the carbon dioxide system on the Great Bahama Bank. Bulletin of Marine Science, 17(2), 348-366