Sensitivity of the North Atlantic to natural and artificial forcing in an ocean general circulation model

Wadley, Martin R., Bigg, Grant R., Stevens, David P. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7283-4405 and Johnson, John A. (1996) Sensitivity of the North Atlantic to natural and artificial forcing in an ocean general circulation model. Journal of Physical Oceanography, 26 (7). pp. 1129-1141.

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Abstract

The sensitivity of the circulation and surface properties of the North Atlantic to different forms of surface forcing is investigated using a Bryan and Cox type model. Forcing taking the form of heat and freshwater fluxes calculated using bulk aerodynamic formulae (with an effective salt flux representing freshwater forcing) failed to simulate the low salinity region in the Labrador Sea and north of the Gulf Stream. By contrast, the use of this form of surface forcing, but with direct freshwater forcing and transport instead of the more commonly used salt flux, reproduces the low salinity in these regions and gives a circulation in good agreement with that obtained using the robust diagnostic mode. Since coupled climate models currently use an artificial salt flux form for the freshwater fluxes between ocean and atmosphere, the poor performance of this surface forcing reported here has significant implications for climate prediction.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	sdg 13 - climate action ,/dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/climate_action
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Mathematics Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Theme - ClimateUEA
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Centre for Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Fluid and Solid Mechanics
Depositing User:	David Stevens
Date Deposited:	01 Dec 2010 14:12
Last Modified:	08 Jul 2023 00:29
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/15865
DOI:	10.1175/1520-0485(1996)026<1129:SOTNAT>2.0.CO;2

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