New CICOR Data to Aid in Understanding Ocean’s Role in Climate Change

Researchers at the Cooperative Institute for Climate and Ocean Research (CICOR) at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) recently released nearly 50 years of data that may significantly increase scientific knowledge of the ocean’s role in climate change. These data allow researchers to estimate the amounts of heat exchange resulting from various thermal interactions between the atmosphere and the ocean, known as “air-sea heat flux.” Air-sea flux to and from the ocean forces atmospheric circulation and, at the same time, controls the ocean temperature. There is increasing evidence that the warming trend of ocean temperature has global impacts on climate. However, further progress on understanding the mechanisms by which the ocean forces atmospheric change has been hampered by the absence of good measures of air-sea exchanges.

The Objectively Analyzed Air-sea Fluxes (OAFlux) project, managed by CICOR Director Dr. Robert Weller and Dr. Lisan Yu, was designed precisely to address this data gap. OAFlux accomplishes this by synthesizing observational data with weather prediction models. More specifically, the project combines satellite-generated data, ship reports, and surface meteorology from numerical weather prediction models. This synthetic approach helps to minimize the shortcomings of each method, thereby providing more accurate heat flux data. Monthly, 1-degree gridded products are available for the period 1958-2006, and daily gridded products are available for the satellite era (1985-2006) at the project website: http://oaflux.whoi.edu. Data after 2006 will be provided as they become available.

Background: The origins of OAFlux can be found in the NOAA-supported Climate Variability and Predictability Atlantic Implementation Panel, which supported the initial pilot effort in demonstrating that improved daily flux fields can be obtained by synthesizing observational data with weather prediction models. The current 50-year global heat flux analysis is sponsored by the NOAA Office of Climate Observations through WHOI and CICOR.

Significance: As global climate change continues its ascent to the tops of national, regional, and international policy agendas, policymakers will increasingly look to the scientific community for answers to the many questions related to climate change. Projects such as OAFlux will play an important role in the effort to provide policymakers with answers to these increasingly complex questions. This research supports NOAA Mission Goal 2 - Understand Climate Variability and Change to Enhance Society's Ability to Plan and Respond.