SIO 210 Talley Topic 4: North Pacific circulation and water masses. Wind forcing.

Lynne Talley, 2000
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Reading and study questions

The following lectures concern specific circulation and water property distributions in each of the oceans. We use a combination of dynamic topographies and water property maps and vertical sections to say what the circulation is, what waters are renewed and hopefully something about the rate of renewal. A number of figures were already presented in the previous lectures, showing meridional vertical sections and vertical profiles of temperature and salinity. Also shown previously were the wind forcing fields, surface temperature and surface salinity. A large number of vertical sections can be perused using the online Vertical Section Atlas.

We begin with the North Pacific because it has the simplest thermohaline forcing of any of the ocean basins and is thus the best basin to first grasp principles of wind-driven circulation. While there is thermohaline forcing in all oceans, and undoubtedly upwelling as a result of the global thermohaline forcing, there are no deep water sources in the North Pacific and the intermediate water sources are weak. Thus the N. Pacific is actively ventilated to no more than 2000 meters depth, which coincides with the depth of the wind-driven circulation. Circulation below this must be thermohaline, but most of the forcing is due to remote deep water formation in the southern ocean and Atlantic. Weak geothermal forcing in the deep North Pacific might also have an effect on the deep circulation. Strong ventilation due to surface outcrops in the open North Pacific affects only the top 1000 meters, and is directly tied to the wind-driven circulation.

Wind forcing and the wind-driven gyres

The wind forcing for the North Pacific consists of westerlies at latitudes north of about 30°N in the mean, and trades to the south. Within the trades occurs the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), centered at 10°N. The dominant pattern of atmospheric circulation north of 30N is associated with the Aleutian Low. The mean winds create Ekman divergence north of about 40°N, Ekman convergence between 15°N and 40°N, and Ekman divergence between 5°N and 15°N. These patterns drive Sverdrup transport which is northward in Ekman divergence regions and southward in Ekman convergence regions. Because the return flow for this interior ocean transport must be in western boundary currents, this produces cyclonic circulation in the north (the subpolar gyre), anticyclonic circulation at mid-latitudes (subtropical gyre), and a meridionally narrow cyclonic circulation centered at 10°N. The western boundary currents associated with these three gyres are: East Kamchatka Current/Oyashio, Kuroshio, and Mindanao Current. These surface circulation patterns are clearly evident in any surface dynamic topography relative to greater depth - e.g. Wyrtki, Reid and Arthur.

At 1000 meters depth, the subtropical gyre differs clearly from the surface gyre - while its northern and western sides appear in the same location as at the surface, its southern boundary is considerably farther north than at the surface, and its eastern portion is weak or non-existent. This poleward shrinkage of the subtropical gyre was first documented by Reid and Arthur and is a feature of the subtropical gyre in every ocean basin.

Vertical changes in the subpolar and tropical cyclonic gyres are not as apparent as in the subtropical gyre, probably because of the very narrow meridional extent of both gyres. The subpolar gyre would extend much farther north but for the presence of Alaska; its extension into the Bering Sea is considerably complicated by the Aleutian Arc. In dynamic topographies, it appears to have little variation in shape with depth although its existence below about 2000 meters is doubtful. The tropical gyre is also very narrow due to the wind pattern which causes it, and its vertical penetration is also not clear.

Current nomenclature.

The eastward flow of the northern subtropical and southern subpolar gyres is referred to as the North Pacific Current. It is not a uniform eastward flow but is punctuated by zonal fronts with somewhat intensified flow which occur at remarkably unchanging latitudes despite strong seasonal and interannual changes in forcing. The two principal fronts are the Subarctic Front at around 40-42°N and the Subtropical Front at around 30-32°N. It is likely that these are eastward extensions of the separated Oyashio and Kuroshio respectively, but it is also clear that several semi-permanent fronts arise from both of these separated currents.

The westward flow of the southern subtropical gyre and northern tropical gyre is referred to as the North Equatorial Current. The NEC appears to be more intense in the tropical circulation than in the subtropical circulation. The eastward flow on the south side of the tropical gyre is the North Equatorial Countercurrent; despite its narrowness it is very swift and carries a large transport. The equatorial currents are described in a later lecture.

Vertical extent of the wind-driven circulation

How deep does the wind-driven circulation extend in the interior of the North Pacific's subtropical region? Using patterns of properties on isopycnals, it is possible to trace a subtropical gyre down to about 2000 meters, with poleward shrinkage throughout this depth. Potential vorticity maps on isopycnals show regions of homogenized potential vorticity which shrink poleward with depth and disappear around 2000-2500 meters. These homogenized regions are presumed to indicate the location of the wind-driven circulation based on Rhines and Young (1982). As noted next, the western boundary current (Kuroshio) does not have the same depth limitations.

Western boundary currents in the North Pacific.

Kuroshio and Kuroshio Extension. The Kuroshio is the western boundary current of the subtropical gyre. Its transport is 60-70 Sv with large seasonal variations. It arises at the western boundary in the bifurcation of the North Equatorial Current; the southward flow is the Mindanao Current and the northward flow the Kuroshio. It passes along the coast of Taiwan and west of the Ryukyu Islands. The western boundary in this region is actually the broad shelf of the East China Sea rather than a continent, and so some of the Kuroshio's transport is actually up on the shelf, although the main core of flow remains in the deep channel. The Kuroshio turns eastward and emerges through Tokara Strait. A small portion remains west of Japan, entering the Japan Sea as the Tsushima Current; surface drifter measurements suggest that the actual continuity of flow into the Japan Sea is marginal.

After passing through Tokara Strait, the Kuroshio continues eastward and passes through the Izu Ridge just south of Japan. Between Tokara Strait and the Izu Ridge, the Kuroshio exists in one of two modes - it either flows due eastward or undergoes a large southward meander. This bimodality appears to be due to the wave-guide nature of the two bounding ridges. When the Kuroshio is in the large meander state, its transport is usually reduced compared to when it follows the "straight" (progressive meandering) path.

The Kuroshio separates from the land at the southeastern corner of Honshu (south of the Boso Peninsula). At this location the Kuroshio often undergoes a large northward meander, which often produces a warm core ring.

In the relatively shallow regions where it is a true western boundary current, the Kuroshio extends to the bottom. On either side of the northward flow it has narrow southward recirculations. Once the Kuroshio crosses the Izu Ridge and enters deep water, its dynamic signature appears to extend to the ocean bottom. Thus the mean currents measured at great depth at 155E show flow below the Kuroshio axis which is eastward relative to stronger recirculation regions to the north and south. However, the actual mean flow along the Kuroshio axis at great depth is weakly westward; one might think of this as a superposition of deep westward flow, perhaps driven through thermohaline forcing, on the deep Kuroshio, which derives its energy from the winds.

East Kamchatka Current/Oyashio. The East Kamchatka Current arises in the Bering Sea and flows along Kamchatka into the open North Pacific. A portion of the flow enters the Okhotsk Sea (around 5 Sv) where it is greatly transformed in properties and emerges with different T/S/O2 characteristics. The Okhotsk current emerges primarily at Bussol' Strait where it joins the EKC. South of this point the western boundary current is referred to as the Oyashio. It flows southward along the remaining Kuril Islands, along the coast of Hokkaido and separates at the southern end of Hokkaido. This location is about 500 km north of the Kuroshio separation point, and coincides more with the N. Pacific zero of Sverdrup transport, than with the zero of wind stress curl (which coincides fairly well with the Kuroshio separation point). East of its separation, the Oyashio can be thought of as continuing as a partially density-compensated front called the Subarctic Front, although the continuity of the Oyashio/ Subarctic Front is somewhat questionable.

The subarctic circulation appears to be composed of four nearly separate cyclonic cells: one in the Gulf of Alaska, one in the western subarctic region, and one in each of the Bering and Okhotsk Seas. Each of these has a western boundary current of sorts - in the Gulf of Alaska it is the Alaskan Stream, which appears to be mainly a northern boundary current except that the coastline has enough slant that it acquires western boundary current identity. This strong current evaporates at the southernmost point of the Aleutians, with some flow turning northward into the Bering Sea, some turning back eastwards. The western boundary currents of the Bering Sea and western subarctic gyres have been referred to already. In the Okhotsk Sea there also occurs a western boundary current - the East Sakhalin Current.

The principal eastern boundary current of the North Pacific is the California Current, which is discussed separately in lecture 7. It arises from a bifurcation of the North Pacific Current (west wind drift). A portion of the North Pacific Current water turns southward into the California Current and and portion northward as the eastern limb of the subpolar gyre. The exact location of the bifurcation, and hence the amount of water which flows northward versus southward, is time dependent. Since the northern waters have high nutrient content, the amount which enters the California Current could impact its local productivity.

Water masses and ventilation of the subtropical gyre.

Surface waters in the northern part of the subtropical gyre are denser than in the southern part. As the anticyclonic circulation advects the higher density waters southward, they must either change to lower density or slide below the less dense surface waters to the south. Since heat fluxes in the eastern parts of subtropical gyres, outside of the upwelling in the eastern boundary currents, are usually quite small, generally the surface waters slide down. This process has been called "subduction". The actual process of subduction might involve the seasonal layer at the very surface: as the denser waters circulate southwards in the warming seasons, the waters at the very surface warm and become less dense. This placed the denser near-surface water (remnant mixed layer) from the north into the circulation below the surface layer.

Subduction is an isopycnal process (flow along isopycnals). It is manifested in the distributions of many tracers along isopycnals which outcrop in the subtropical gyre. In the North Pacific, a shallow salinity minimum in the eastern part of the subtropical gyre is created as the northernmost, freshest water of the subtropical gyre subducts beneath the saltier (warmer and less dense) water farther south. Tongues of tritium which is input from the sea surface, and at a higher rate in more northern latitudes are also indicators of subduction.

The density range of subducting waters extends to the maximum density which outcrops in the subtropical gyre, that is, along its northern boundary with the subpolar gyre. In the North Pacific, this maximum subducting density is around 26.2 sigma theta.

There are two quite different ideas for maintenance of the the main thermocline lying below the surface layer. The first is that its properties are mainly set by this subduction process, which occurs along isopycnals. The second is that the thermocline properties and vertical temperature/salinity/density profile are set by a vertical process (across isopycnals) - through mixing. The truth is likely a combination of both processes.

The "water masses" which are created by subduction are the Central Water (water in the thermocline, spread along a continuous temperature/salinity range), and Subtropical Underwater (salinity maximum arising from subduction of the very high central subtropical gyre waters beneath the fresher waters which lie to the south).

Subtropical mode water. In the western subtropical North Pacific, the main thermocline (pycnocline) is interrupted by a "thermostad" (pycnostad), which is a region of lower vertical gradients of temperature, salinity and density, compared with the thermocline above and below. Such a thermostad is typical of the major subtropical western boundary current recirculation regions in each ocean. This pycnostad in the North Pacific is referred to as "Subtropical Mode Water". "Mode" means relatively larger large volume on a volumetric T-S diagram (illustrate).

The STMW in the North Pacific is in the temperature range of 16-19C and is found just south of the Kuroshio Extension (Masuzawa, 1969). The temperature of the thick layer decreases eastward. This region is subject to two processes which could contribute to the thickness of the mode water: large winter heat loss due to the advection of warm water into the region combined with cold, dry air blowing off the continents, and the tilt of isopycnals in the Kuroshio Extension and recirculation which creates a "bowl" of warm water between the Kuroshio Extension and the recirculation. (The isopycnal tilting is of course associated with vertical shear of the horizontal geostrophic currents.)

Figure. Potential temperature at 149E (WOCE section P10) and Sigma theta at 149E (WOCE section P10) illustrating the North Pacific Subtropical Mode Water just south of the Kuroshio.

Water masses and ventilation of the subpolar gyre

There is no subduction in the subpolar gyre in the same sense as in the subtropical gyre since it is a region of upwelling rather than downwelling. (This has been recently referred to as a region of "obduction", where the water comes up rather than subducting, or going down.) Surface densities are higher in the west than in the east, and are highest in the Okhotsk Sea, along Hokkaido and just south of Hokkaido. The highest surface densities are coincident with input of saline waters from the Japan Sea - through Soya Strait into the Okhotsk Sea and through Tsugaru Strait into the region south of Hokkaido.

Sea ice formation in the Okhotsk ventilates the upper portion of the intermediate density layer of the North Pacific. Vertical mixing can be shown to be locally very important for extending the ventilated waters downward in the water column, especially along the Kuril Islands. The ventilated waters from the Okhotsk Sea exit through Bussol' Strait and join the remaining western boundary current waters of the East Kamchatka Current. The Okhotsk Sea ventilation is apparent in distributions of oxygen, chlorofluorocarbons, and tritium on isopycnals which clearly lie below the highest density found at the sea surface in winter in the open North Pacific. It is also apparent in the salinity distribution: since the water which is "formed" is very cold at its formation site, it is also the freshest water on its isopycnal. This is true even though brine rejection is part of the formation process: the rejected brine enters the near surface waters, which are close to freezing, and increases their density through the addition of salt. Thus there is a downward salt flux which is reflected in the appearance of newly ventilated, cold, fresh water at a higher density than at the sea surface.

The ventilated waters of the western subpolar gyre enter the subtropical gyre mainly along the western boundary, probably as meanders and intrusions from the separating Oyashio. Because they are quite fresh, they appear as a salinity minimum in the subtropical gyre. The salinity minimum itself appears close to the top of the layer which enters from the subpolar gyre. It or the full intermediate layer are often called North Pacific Intermediate Water.

The surface layer of the eastern subpolar gyre is a thick warm layer which is advected counterclockwise around the Alaskan gyre. West of the dateline, in the western Subarctic Gyre, a temperature minimum layer is usually found in summer. The temperature minimum arises from cooling in the winter and is permitted by the relatively strong subpolar halocline (fresh at the surface, increasing salinity with depth). Associated with the T min layer is very high oxygen saturation in the summertime, due to capping by surface warm water and slight warming of the subsurface T min layer. In the Japanese literature the temperature minimum layer is referred to as the dichothermal layer. Below the T min naturally there must be a temperature maximum layer, referred to as the mesothermal layer in Japanese literature. The maximum temperature indicates that this water must have a substantial component which comes from either the east or the south since otherwise it would have acquired the low temperature of the surface layer. In the Okhotsk Sea, the temperature minimum layer is much thicker and much deeper, reflecting the deep ventilation that occurs there.

A well-developed oxygen minimum layer lies at about 1500 meters. This is clearly within the depth range of NPIW ventilation, albeit very weak ventilation. The oxygen minimum is intensified within the bowl of the subtropical/subpolar gyres.

Deep waters of the North Pacific.

Below the intermediate, ventilated layer lies the nearly homogeneous deep water layer, between about 2000 and 4000 meters. Its origin is basically upwelling of the southern source bottom waters (sometimes known as Circumpolar Water). This is the oldest deep water in the world ocean, and is fairly well mixed. The Worthington (1982) volumetric T/S diagrams shown in topic 2 show the relative homogeneity of the Pacific deep water (also known as Pacific Common Water), with more water in a single T/S category than for any other part of the world ocean.

There are indications of slight warming on the bottom of the North Pacific, due to gentle geothermal heating. A characteristic of the Pacific Deep Water is a vertical deep silica maximum, whose lateral origin is in the northeastern Pacific. It is separated from the bottom Antarctic Bottom Water (also known as Lower Circumpolar Water) by a so-called "benthic front" in the southern and western North Pacific. The densest water enters the North Pacific across the equator in the west, through Samoan Passage (S. Pacific). This water flows northward and splits in the western N. Pacific, with a portion flowing eastward south of Hawaii and a portion continuing northward, possibly through Wake Passage but in a generally broad flow.

Silica on a near-bottom isopycnal reveals two separate deep circulations, which appear to be anticyclonic rather than cyclonic; one concentrated north of the latitude of the Hawaiian Island and the other to the south. Densest water enters the northern North Pacific along the western boundary, primarily channelled by the deep trenches along the western and northern boundaries.

Carbon-14 dating of deep waters - Stuiver

Connection of the North Pacific to the global ocean.

Reid and Lynn's (1973) isopycnal plots suggest the influence of NADW on a global scale. The freshest water on the characteristic isopycnal is in the North Pacific, if one ignores the narrow band around the Antarctic. This freshening indicates the importance of vertical mixing despite the assumption of isopycnal movement of waters. The high salinity of the NADW creates a relatively high salinity circumpolar water which spreads northward in the Pacific to become the bottom water of the North Pacific. This is freshened and warmed (upwells) in the North Pacific.