Publication Date:
2022-05-26
Description:
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution July 1991
Description:
Six hydrographic basinwide sections, two in each of the three major ocean
basins, are employed in a set of inverse calculations to determine the extent of exchange
between the Pacific and Indian Oceans through the Indonesian Archipelago
and the net global oceanic heat flux at 30°S.
Using a model which combines the data for the South Pacific and South
Indian Oceans, it is found that even the largest existing estimates of Indonesian
Passage through flow (20 Sv) are consistent with the data. However, the available
information cannot limit the extent of the exchange, i.e. both smaller and larger
through flows produce physically reasonable circulation patterns. The seasonal
and interannual variations which have been found by other investigators and which
we are incapable of resolving, lead us to conclude that in the long term mean an
estimate of ~10 Sv for the through flow is most reasonable.
Globally, at 30°S, we find a net oceanic heat flux of -1.1 ± 1.7 PW, which is
not significantly different from zero. It is dominated by a large (〉1 PW) southward
heat flux in the Indian Ocean. Large equatorward (~0.8 PW) heat flux values in the
South Atlantic Basin are not consistent with our data. We therefore conclude that
although our data are consistent with some water following the warm water return
path for NADW (Gordon 1986), the cold water path must play the dominant role
in the maintenance of the global thermohaline cell associated with the formation
process of NADW.
Keywords:
Ocean temperature
;
Ocean circulation
Repository Name:
Woods Hole Open Access Server
Type:
Thesis
Format:
application/pdf
