ALBERT

Description: During the last decade, two important collections of carbon relevant hydrochemical data have become available: GLODAP and CARINA. These collections comprise a synthesis of bottle data for all ocean depths from many cruises collected over several decades. For a majority of the cruises at least two carbon parameters were measured. However, for a large number of stations, samples or even cruises, the carbonate system is under-determined (i.e., only one or no carbonate parameterwas measured) resulting in data gaps for the carbonate system in these collections. A method for filling these gaps would be very useful, as it would help with estimations of the anthropogenic carbon (Cant) content or quantification of oceanic acidification. The aim of this work is to apply and describe, a 3D moving window multilinear regression algorithm (MLR) to fill gaps in total alkalinity (AT) of the CARINA and GLODAP data collections for the Atlantic. In addition to filling data gaps, the estimated AT values derived from the MLR are useful in quality control of the measurements of the carbonate system, as they can aid in the identification of outliers. For comparison, a neural network algorithm able to performnon-linear predictionswas also designed. The goal herewas to design an alternative approach to accomplish the sametask of filling AT gaps. Bothmethods return internally consistent results, thereby giving confidence in our approach. Highlights: ► Estimation of alkalinity by multilinear regression (MLR) techniques ► Estimation of alkalinity by neural network techniques ► Intercomparison between alkalinity prediction techniques ► Use of Alkalinity estimation for carbon calculations ► Use of alkalinity estimation for quality control of measurements

Description: The western basin of the South Atlantic from 10ºN to 55ºS and from the coast to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is a region with large uncertainties as to the storage of anthropogenic CO2 (Cant). Our analysis of data of the last three decades provides a Cant storage rate of 0.92 ±0.13 mol m-2 y-1, i.e., 13%-35% higher than previous estimates in this area. The low but significant Cant concentrations ([Cant]) in the large volume of relatively well ventilated Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW) may well be the underlying cause of this higher storage rate. In fact, the significant contribution in terms of Cant of this ventilated AABW that enters the western South Atlantic Ocean was calculated to be 0.055 ± 0.02 Pg C y-1 or 0.20 mol m-2 y-1. Instead of being based on the annual trend, the Cant specific inventory (in mol m-2) evolution is more consistently computed as a function of the atmospheric xCO2 perturbation in ppm, (0.64 mol m-2 ppm-1). This methodology allows improved projections of Cant storage rates over long periods.