Role of Sea Ice and Ocean in the Observed Increase in Arctic Liquid Freshwater Content

Details

• Journal Title:
  Journal of Climate
• Personal Author:
  Verma, Tarun ; Weijer, Wilbert ; Haine, Thomas W. N. ; Veneziani, Milena ; Kim, Who M. ; Zhang, Jiaxu
• NOAA Program & Office:
  OAR (Oceanic and Atmospheric Research) ; CICOES (Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean and Ecosystem Studies) ; PMEL (Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory)
• Description:
  While the Arctic sea ice has declined, the Arctic Ocean has accumulated significant liquid freshwater in the past two decades. These changes in the Arctic freshwater system are controlled by naturally occurring climate variability and anthropogenically forced changes involving meteoric, sea ice, and oceanic freshwater sources. This study elucidates the mechanisms of the increase in the Arctic liquid freshwater content and investigates the role of sea ice and ocean in modulating the increase using a large ensemble of fully coupled simulations and an atmospheric forced ocean–sea ice simulation within the Community Earth System Model framework. The freshening of the upper Arctic Ocean since the mid-1990s has been primarily caused by anthropogenically driven changes in the sea ice cycle, resulting in an anomalous increase in freshwater passing from the solid phase into the liquid phase. Natural variations in the ocean circulation impact the spatial distribution of the increase, moving it from the Eurasian into the Canadian basin. The contrasting changes in oceanic freshwater fluxes and their volume transport- and salinity-driven contributions in the two configurations suggest that these responses are subjected to significant oceanic variability. Additionally, the differences in river runoff responses in the two types of simulations indicate potential deficiencies in the coupled model representation of the land hydrological cycle.
• Source:
  Journal of Climate, 38(18), 4677-4697
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-24-0368.1
• ISSN:
  0894-8755 ; 1520-0442
• Format:
  pdf
• Publisher:
  American Meteorological Society|https://ror.org/00dpx3e98
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Rights Information:
  Other
• Compliance:
  Submitted
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:6f026e2d637f124535f245ee0d95a3dc7efe8e0e50c03cf2e2f1ba7dfffb2a6e5ad89ddaa6827a687fec3bfb58d323cdbe7544e8c84677a400b3c3a98608e268
• Download URL:
  https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/71666/noaa_71666_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 34.10 MB ]