Which one of the following statements are correct? (A) Ocean currents provide a high degree of regulation to the thermal environments of the earth‘s surface (B) On a local scale, warm water currents bring moderating influence to coasts in arctic latitudes (C) Cold currents are not able to bring down the temperature of tropical deserts (D) Density differences may also cause flow of ocean water Choose the correct answer from the options given below:

Which one of the following statements are correct? (A) Ocean currents provide a high degree of regulation to the thermal environments of the earth‘s surface (B) On a local scale, warm water currents bring moderating influence to coasts in arctic latitudes (C) Cold currents are not able to bring down the temperature of tropical deserts (D) Density differences may also cause flow of ocean water Choose the correct answer from the options given below: Correct Answer (A), (B) and (D) only

Correct Answer: ​(A), (B), and (D) only.

Key Points

• Ocean currents act much like a conveyor belt, transporting warm water and precipitation from the equator toward the poles and cold water from the poles back to the tropics. Thus, ocean currents regulate global climate, helping to counteract the uneven distribution of solar radiation reaching Earth's surface.
• Without currents in the ocean, regional temperatures would be more extreme—super hot at the equator and frigid toward the poles—and much less of Earth’s land would be habitable.

Additional Information

Causes of ocean currents:

• The general circulation is governed by the equation of motion, one of the fundamental laws of mechanics developed by English physicist and mathematician Sir Isaac Newton that was applied to a continuous volume of water.
• This equation states that the product of mass and current acceleration equals the vector sum of all forces that act on the mass. Besides gravity, the most important forces that cause and affect ocean currents are horizontal pressure-gradient forces, Coriolis forces, and frictional forces. Temporal and inertial terms are generally of secondary importance to the general flow, though they become important for transient features such as meanders and eddies.