Intercomparison and validation of ocean–atmosphere energy flux fields. Final report of the Joint WCRP/SCOR Working Group on Air–Sea Fluxes (SCOR Working Group 110)
Year: 2000
Type: book
Abstract: The Working GroupThe main aims of the Joint JSC/SCOR Working Group on Air Sea Fluxes 1 were to review the requirements of different scientific disciplines for surface flux data sets, to catalogue available surface flux data and flux-related data sets, and to review the strengths and weaknesses of each.The three meetings of the Working Group were (1) NOAA Headquarters (Silver Spring, Maryland, USA), 22nd to 25th October 1997; (2) KNMI (De Bilt, The Netherlands) 14th to 17th April 1999; (3) SOC (Southampton, UK) 6th to 10th December, 1999.The Working Group's findings are contained in this report, which has been prepared on an accelerated schedule at the request of the JSC. The Fluxes ConsideredThe Fluxes considered by the working group were the transfers of heat, water and momentum between the sea and the air.The flux products considered were those which: were readily available to all scientists; were a gridded, derived surface flux or flux related field; covered major ocean basin scales and upwards; and, were adequately documented.The Working Group has assembled a catalogue of flux products which meet these criteria.It will be available on the Internet 2 and described in an appendix to this report.Given the limited time and resources, it only proved practicable to evaluate a subset of the more recently available flux products.The Working Group also summarised the State-of-the-Art with regard to the basic meteorological variables (used in flux calculation), and other important components of the climate system such as Waves and Sea Ice. Requirements and data sourcesThe Working Group has reviewed the requirements for flux fields and the characteristics of the various data sources available for flux estimation.The latter include in situ data from ships, buoys, rigs, etc.; instruments on satellites either in polar (or other precessing) orbits or geostationary; and models, run either in operational Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) or reanalysis modes.The requirements for surface flux fields are many and diverse.However the Working Groups review suggests that there are four main types of requirement.One class of requirement is the need for surface flux fields on high time and space resolution; typically 3 hours and 50 km.Such data are needed, for example, for forcing ocean general circulation models, for wave modelling and forecasting, and for regional weather nowcasting and prediction.Such high space/time resolution is only possible at present using models, however in future, high resolution satellite products will become available.The quality of the wind fields is particularly important for these applications and operational satellite-borne scatterometers are expected to make an important contribution.A second class of requirement is for flux fields on longer space and time scales but with high absolute accuracy, typically within a few W/m 2 .Customers for these data include climate and sea-ice modellers.At present such needs are difficult to satisfy because of the problems of quantifying systematic errors in the flux data.Only by comparing flux values obtained using different data sources and estimation methods are these stringent accuracy requirements likely to be obtained.1 (SCOR Working Group 110: Intercomparison and Validation of Ocean-Atmosphere Energy Flux Fields) 2
Authors: Sergey Gulev, Peter K. Taylor
Language: English
Subfield: Oceanography
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Climate action
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W182288807