The Physical Chemistry of Seawater

Abstract

This review is largely (but not exclusively) devoted to developments that have been made on the physical chemistry of seawater subsequent to the recent review of Pytkowicz & Kester (320). A number of other reviews have been written that deal with specific topics of the physical chemistry of seawater (53, 86, 114, 137, 160, 171, 1 73, 176,210,242,257,265,27 1,314,343,353,380). Because the application of physical chemical techniques to ocean problems has been widespread in recent years, no attempt is made to cover all of these areas in this review. The author is presently writing a book on marine physical chemistry (273) that hopefully will cover these developments. We confine our discussion in this review to the physical chemistry of typical or average seawater and the interactions that occur in this medium. We discuss in detail the interactions of the major ionic components of seawater, how these interactions affect chemical processes occurring in the oceans, and how the physical chemical properties of seawater depend upon these interactions. Because of space requirements this review is limited in scope and is based on the author's major interests. In recent years, there have been a number of excellent books written on marine chemistry that show how one can directly apply physical chemical principles to marine systems (16,28,104,1 26,140,141,172,1 74,354). Berner ( 16), for example, has written a book in which he applies physical chemical principles to low tempera­ ture geological problems. Stumm & Morgan (354) have written a book in which they discuss chemical equilibria in natural waters. Garrels & Christ's (126) book on the application of thermodynamics to mineral equilibria is still the classic text used by many workers as a source of information. Horne (172) has written a text on marine chemistry that stresses the importance of understanding the nature of water and a less descriptive science to one that attempts to probe the chemical processes occur­ ring in the oceans, Horne's book is certainly needed. Although one might question