• Question: Why is the sea salty?

    Asked by xhanhanx to Laura, Lily, Mark, Paul, Sarah on 22 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Sarah Bardsley

      Sarah Bardsley answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      Because it contains dissolved salt which comes from minerals, dissolved rocks and sediments and is washed into the oceans via rivers and streams. Rain and deep sea vents also contribute.

    • Photo: Mark Roberts

      Mark Roberts answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      It probably comes from rocks – you’re used to mineral water yes? This contains many salts and in the oceans water is evaporated by the sun so the salts washed into them from rivers etc become more concentrated hence salt water

      http://www.utdallas.edu/~pujana/oceans/why.html

      possibly explains it better than me

    • Photo: Lily Asquith

      Lily Asquith answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      because sea water is full of minerals and one of them is salt

    • Photo: Paul Roche

      Paul Roche answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      It’s because of the minerals washed out of the rocks (you learn about the water cycle in school, but I’m not sure you learn about the rock cycle?) – lots of sodium-based minerals end up in the sea, making it salty (salt is sodium chloride, NaCl).

    • Photo: Laura Maliszewski

      Laura Maliszewski answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      I’m not sure. Probably because the earth’s crust contains salts that haven been dissolved in the ocean.

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