Electromagnetic forces on the earth's core due to the poleward transport of heat in the oceans

Poleward heat transport in the oceans generate global-scale electric currents and associated Lorentz forces in the Earth's core. We make a first estimate of this effect using a simple zonally averaged model from which we obtain analytical/numerical solutions. The results indicate that the poleward heat transport in the presence of Main field reversals having periods of 10,000 to 10 million years lead to large-scale electric currents in the core of order 10(-11) to 10(-13) A/m(2) which although extremely small, imply poleward forces in the core which are likely to have acted systematically throughout the history of the planet.