Abstract
The gyres of the Iceland and Greenland Seas are regions of deep-water formation, driven by large ocean-to-atmosphere heat fluxes that have local maxima adjacent to the sea-ice edge. Recently these regions have experienced a dramatic loss of sea ice, including in winter, which begs the question have surface heat fluxes in the adjacent ocean gyres been affected? To address this a set of regional atmospheric climate model simulations has been run with prescribed sea ice and sea surface temperature fields. Three 20-year model experiments have been examined: Icemax, Icemed and Icemin, where the surface fields are set as the year with maximum, median and minimum sea-ice extents respectively. Under conditions of reduced sea-ice extent there is a 15% (19 W m−2) decrease in total wintertime heat fluxes in the Iceland Sea. In contrast, there is an 8% (9 W m−2) increase in heat fluxes in the Greenland Sea primarily due to higher local SSTs. These differences are manifest as changes in the magnitude of high heat flux events (such as cold air outbreaks). In the Iceland Sea, 76% of these events are lower in magnitude during reduced sea-ice conditions. In the Greenland Sea, 93% of these events are higher in magnitude during reduced sea-ice conditions as a result of higher SSTs coincident with retreating sea ice. So, in these experiments, the reduced wintertime sea-ice conditions force a different response in the two seas. In both gyres, large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns are key drivers of high heat flux events.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Brümmer B (1997) Boundary layer mass, water and heat budgets in wintertime cold-air outbreaks from the Arctic sea ice. Mon Wea Rev 125:1824–1837
Cavalieri DJ, Parkinson CL (2012) Arctic sea ice variability and trends, 1979–2010. Cryosphere 6:881–889. https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-6-881-2012
Chechin DG, Lüpkes C (2017) Boundary-layer development and low-level baroclinicity during high-latitude cold-air outbreaks: a simple model. Bound Layer Meteorol 162:91. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-016-0193-2
Chechin DG, Lüpkes C, Repina IA, Gryanik VM (2013) Idealized dry quasi 2-d mesoscale simulations of cold-air outbreaks over the marginal sea ice zone with fine and coarse resolution. J Geophys Res Atmos 118(16):8787–8813. https://doi.org/10.1002/jgrd.50679
Condron A, Renfrew IA (2013) The impact of polar mesoscale storms on northeast Atlantic Ocean circulation. Nat Geosci 6:34–37. https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1661
Condron A, Bigg GR, Renfrew IA (2008) Modelling the impact of polar mesoscale cyclones on ocean circulation. J Geophysical Res (Oceans) 113:C10005. https://doi.org/10.1029/2007JC004599
Cook PA, Renfrew IA (2015) Aircraft-based observations of air–sea turbulent fluxes around the British Isles. Q J Roy Meteorol Soc. 141:139–152. https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.2345
Dee D et al (2011) The ERA-Interim reanalysis: configuration and performance of the data assimilation system. Q J R Meteorol Soc 137:553–597. https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.828
Donlon CJ, Martin M, Stark J, Roberts-Jones J, Fiedler E, Wimmer W (2012) The operational sea surface temperature and sea ice analysis (OSTIA) system. Rem Sens Env 116:140–158. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2010.10.017
Elvidge AD, Renfrew IA, Weiss AI, Brooks IM, Lachlan-Cope TA, King JC (2016) Observations of surface momentum exchange over the marginal-ice-zone and recommendations for its parameterization. Atmos Chem Phys 16:1545–1563. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-16-1545-2016
Gill AE (1982) Atmosphere-ocean dynamics. Academic Press, New York
Harden BE, Renfrew IA, Petersen GN (2011) A climatology of wintertime barrier winds off southeast Greenland. J Clim 24:4701–4717. https://doi.org/10.1175/2011JCLI4113.1
Harden BE, Renfrew IA, Petersen GN (2015) Meteorological buoy observations from the central Iceland Sea. J Geophys Res Atmos 120:3199–3208. https://doi.org/10.1002/(2014)JD022584
Jung T, Serrar S, Wang Q (2014) The oceanic response to mesoscale atmospheric forcing. Geophys Res Lett 41:1255–1260. https://doi.org/10.1002/2013GL059040
Kolstad EW (2017) Higher ocean wind speeds during marine cold air outbreaks. Q J R Meteorol Soc 143:2084–2092
Liu AQ, Moore GWK, Tsuboki K, Renfrew IA (2006) The effect of the sea-ice zone on the development of boundary-layer roll clouds during cold-air outbreaks. Bound Layer Meteorol 118:557–581. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10546-005-6434-4
Lüpkes C, Gryanik VM, Hartmann J, Andreas EL (2012) A parametrization, based on sea ice morphology, of the neutral atmospheric drag coefficients for weather predict ion and climate models. J Geophys Res 117:D13112. https://doi.org/10.1029/2012JD017630
Marshall J, Schott F (1999) Open-ocean convection: observation, theory, and models. Rev Geophys 37:1–64. https://doi.org/10.1029/98RG02739
Michel C, Terpstra A, Spengler T (2018) Polar mesoscale cyclone climatology for the Nordic Seas based on ERA-Interim. J Clim 31(6):2511–2532
Moore GWK, Renfrew IA, Pickart RS (2012) Spatial distribution of air-sea heat fluxes over the sub-polar North Atlantic Ocean. Geophys Res Lett 39:L18806. https://doi.org/10.1029/2012GL053097
Moore GWK, Våge K, Pickart RS, Renfrew IA (2015) Decreasing intensity of open-ocean convection in the Greenland and Iceland seas. Nat Clim Change 5:877–882. https://doi.org/10.1038/NCLIMATE2688
Onarheim IH, Eldevik T, Smedsrud LH, Stroeve JC (2018) Seasonal and regional manifestation of Arctic sea ice loss. J Clim 31:4917–4932. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0427.1
Papritz L, Spengler T (2017) A Lagrangian climatology of wintertime cold air outbreaks in the Irminger and Nordic Seas and their role in shaping air–sea heat fluxes. J Clim 30:2717–2737. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-16-0605.1
Petersen GN, Renfrew IA (2009) Aircraft-based observations of air-sea fluxes over Denmark Strait and the Irminger Sea during high wind speed conditions. Q J R Meteorol Soc 135(645):2030–2045. https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.355
Renfrew IA, Moore GWK (1999) An extreme cold air outbreak over the Labrador Sea: roll vortices and air-sea interaction. Mon Wea Rev 127:2379–2394
Renfrew IA, Moore GWK, Kristjánsson JE, Ólafsson H, Gray SL, Petersen GN, Bovis K, Brown PRA, Føre I, Haine T, Hay C, Irvine EA, Lawrence A, Ohigashi T, Outten S, Pickart RS, Shapiro M, Sproson D, Swinbank R, Woolley A, Zhang S (2008) The Greenland flow distortion experiment. Bull Amer Meteorol Soc 89:1307–1324
Renfrew IA, Elvidge AD, Edwards J (2019a) Atmospheric sensitivity to marginal-ice-zone drag: local and global responses. Q J R Meteorol Soc 145:1165–1179. https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.3486
Renfrew IA et al (2019b) The Iceland Greenland Seas project. Bull Am Meteorol Soc 100:1795–1817. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0217.1
Roberts-Jones J, Fiedler EK, Martin MJ (2012) Daily, global, high-resolution SST and sea Ice reanalysis for 1985–2007 using the OSTIA system. J Clim 25:6215–6232. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00648.1
Smith SD (1980) Wind stress and heat flux over the ocean in gale force winds. J Phys Oceanogr 10:709–726. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0485(1980)010%3c0709:WSAHFO%3e2.0.CO;2
Våge K, Pickart RS, Spall MA, Valdimasson H, Jónsson S, Torres DJ, Østerhus S, Eldevik T (2011) Significant role of the North Icelandic jet in the formation of Denmark strait overflow water. Nat Geo 4:723–727. https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1234
Våge K, Pickart RS, Spall MA, Moore GWK, Valdimarsson H, Torres DJ, Erofeeva SY, Nilsen JEO (2013) Revised circulation scheme north of the Denmark strait. Deep Sea Res I 79:20–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dsr.201305.007
Våge K, Papritz L, Håvik L, Spall M, Moore G (2018) Ocean convection linked to the recent ice edge retreat along east Greenland. Nat Comms 9:1287. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-03468-6
Wadhams P (1998) The odden ice tongue and Greenland Sea convection. Weather 54:83–84
Wadhams P, Comiso JC (1999) Two modes of appearance of the odden ice tongue in the Greenland Sea. Geophys Res Lett 26:2497–2500. https://doi.org/10.1029/1999GL900502
Walters D et al (2017) The met office unified model global atmosphere 6.0/6.1 and JULES global land 6.0/6.1 configurations. Geosci Model Dev 10:1487–1520. https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-10-1487-2017
Acknowledgements
JOP, TJB, IAR and ADE acknowledge the support of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) grant: NE/N009924/1 and NE/N009754/1 (Atmospheric Forcing of the Iceland Sea—the UK’s contribution to the Iceland Greenland Seas Project). We are grateful to the ECMWF for the provision of the ERA-Interim meteorological fields (available here: http://apps.ecmwf.int/datasets/data/interim-mdfa/). The OSTIA data was downloaded from the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service. It is identified in their system as: SST_GLO_SST_L4_REP_OBSERVATIONS_010_011 and access to the data can be found here: http://marine.copernicus.eu/services-portfolio/access-to-products/?option = com_csw&view = details&product_id = SST_GLO_SST_L4_REP_OBSERVATIONS_010_011. Model data fields used in this study will be available from the IGP Project archive at the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis, which can be found here: https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/2780d047461c42f0a12534ccf42f487a. The code for the heat flux event algorithm can be accessed via the IGP GitHub repository here: https://github.com/IGPResearch/bas. The authors would like to thank Dr Stuart Webster (UK Met Office) for his assistance in setting up and using the MetUM Nested Suite and Willie McGinty (National Centre for Atmospheric Science) for assistance in producing model GRIB files from the ERA-Interim reanalysis. Simulations were run on the UK Met Office HPC facility MONSooN from February 2018 to September 2018. We would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments which improved the final manuscript and the accessibility of the figures.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Pope, J.O., Bracegirdle, T.J., Renfrew, I.A. et al. The impact of wintertime sea-ice anomalies on high surface heat flux events in the Iceland and Greenland Seas. Clim Dyn 54, 1937–1952 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-019-05095-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-019-05095-3