TOGA-COARE Enhanced Monitoring Array Analyses
Heat Balance Analyses
Meghan Cronin and Michael McPhaden, PMEL
Heat Balance in the Western Equatoral Pacific During COARE IOP
Cronin, M.F. and M. J. McPhaden, The upper ocean heat balance in the western equatorial Pacific during September-December 1992. J. Geophys. Res., 102,
8533-8553, 1997.
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Hourly data at 0o,156oE and daily subsurface
temperature data from nearby moorings were used to evaluate nearly all
terms in the surface heat balance. Variability in the net surface heat flux
was the primary process responsible for SST variations. However, zonal
advection was an important secondary process.
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Seasonal Heat Balance across the Equatoral Pacific
Wang and McPhaden, The surface layer heat balance in the equatorial
Pacific ocean, Part I: Mean seasonal cycle. summitted to J. Phys. Oceanogr.
1998.
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Multi-year time series from Tropical Atmosphere Ocean (TAO) buoys,
and from Comprehensive Ocean Atmosphere Data Set (COADS) were used to
evaluate the seasonal heat balance at 4 locations across the equatorial
Pacific: in the western
(165oE), central (170oW), and eastern (140oW
and 110oW) Pacific.
This analysis helps place the regional COARE heat balances into
a framework of the basin-scale variability.
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Interannual Heat Balance
across the Equatoral Pacific
Wang and
McPhaden, The surface layer heat balance in the equatorial Pacific
ocean, Part II: Interannual variability., in prep.
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The net surface heat flux cannot account for the interannual SST
change, but works as a negative feedback to damp the SST signal in the
equatorial Pacific.
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Zonal heat advection and vertical turbulent heat flux are responsible
for the SST warming during El Nino in the central and eastern Pacific.
../.././lab_review.html
Funding support provided by NOAA/OGP
1998 PMEL Science Review - http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/programs/98prog-agenda.html
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