On 7/2/2012 5:38 PM, Doug Miller wrote:
Just Wondering wrote in news:4ff1d13e$0$26191$882e7ee2
@usenet-news.net:

Start with a calculation of how much energy it would take to warm the
upper 50 feet of ocean by 1 degree F.
Easily enough done.

Water surface area of the Earth: 362,000,000 km^2 = 3.62E8 km^2 = 3.62E14m^2
Thus the top 15 meters has a volume of approximately 5.43E15 m^3 = 5.43E18 liters
Its mass is approximately 5.4E18 kg = 5.4E21 g
Energy required to raise the temperature by 1 deg F = 0.56 deg C = 5.4E21 * 0.56 = approx
3E21 cal = 1.3E22 joules

Roughly 13,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 joules (13 sextillion).

I would be very surprised if all
the energy released by human activity in the last 50 years, if it all
went directly into heating the oceans, would be enough to accomplish that.
It's close.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption

But very little of that energy goes into heating the oceans. Most of it
eventually radiates into space.