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Interannual variability of wind power input to near-inertial motions in the North Atlantic

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Abstract

Near-inertial oscillations are ubiquitous in the ocean and are believed to play an important role in the global climate system. Studies on wind power input to near-inertial motions (WPI) have so far focused primarily on estimating the time-mean WPI, with little attention being paid to its temporal variability. In this study, a combination of atmospheric reanalysis products, a high-resolution ocean model and linear regression models are used to investigate for the first time the relationship between interannual variability of WPI in the North Atlantic and the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), motivated by the idea that the NAO serves as a good indicator for storminess over the North Atlantic and that storms account for the majority of WPI. It is found that WPI at low and high latitudes of the North Atlantic is significantly correlated to the NAO, owing to its influence on the configuration of the storm track. Positive (negative) NAO conditions are associated with increased WPI in the subpolar (subtropical) ocean. Basin-wide WPI is found to be significantly enhanced under negative NAO conditions, but is not significantly different from the climatological average under positive NAO conditions. This indicates a weak inverse relationship between basin-wide WPI and the NAO, contradicting intuitive expectations. The asymmetric impact of the NAO on basin-wide WPI results from greater sensitivity of WPI to near-inertial wind forcing at lower latitudes due to the variation of the Coriolis parameter with latitude.

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Notes

  1. Such as mixed-layer deepening due to entrainment as proposed for example by Furuichi et al. (2008) and Zhai et al. (2009).

  2. The North Atlantic basin here refers to the region between 25° and 65° N and between 90° W and 0° E.

  3. A common measure of the intermittency of a given time series is kurtosis. Indeed, the spatial distribution of NIWSM kurtosis supports the following argument (not shown).

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Acknowledgments

We thank Sergey Gulev and Natalia Tilinina of the P. P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology of the Russian Academy of Sciences for kindly providing the storm path data. Numerical model experiments were carried out on the High Performance Computing Cluster supported by the Research and Specialist Computing Support service at the University of East Anglia. RJG and WR are grateful for the support from the GEOMAR. We would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. GEOMAR | Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Kiel, Germany

    Tina Dippe, Richard J. Greatbatch & Willi Rath

  2. Centre for Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK

    Xiaoming Zhai

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  1. Tina Dippe
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  2. Xiaoming Zhai
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  3. Richard J. Greatbatch
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  4. Willi Rath
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Correspondence to Tina Dippe.

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Responsible Editor: Chris Wilson

This article is part of the Topical Collection on Atmosphere and Ocean Dynamics: A Scientific Workshop to Celebrate Professor Dr. Richard Greatbatch’s 60th Birthday, Liverpool, UK, 10–11 April 2014

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Dippe, T., Zhai, X., Greatbatch, R.J. et al. Interannual variability of wind power input to near-inertial motions in the North Atlantic. Ocean Dynamics 65, 859–875 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-015-0834-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-015-0834-x

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