The Freshwater Budget of the Arctic Ocean

630 Pages·2000·28.58 MB·English

by  Anders Stigebrandt (auth.)

The Freshwater Budget of the Arctic Ocean
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Series 2. Environment Security - Vol. 70
The Freshwater Budget
of the Arctic Ocean
edited by
Edward Lyn Lewis
Emeritus, InstituIe of Ocean Sciences,
Sidney, B.C., Canada
Associale Editors:
E. Peter Jones
Bedford Institute of Oceanography.
Dartmouth, N.S., Canada
Peter Lemke
Professor of MeteoroJogy,
Instituie of Marine Research,
Kiel, Germany
Terry D. Prowse
National Waler Research Institute,
Saskatoon, Sk., Canada
aod
Peter Wadhams
Reader in Polar Siudies,
Scott Polar Research Instituie,
Universily of Cambridge, U.K.
Springer Science+Business Media, B.V.
Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on
The Freshwater Budget of the Arctic Ocean
Tallinn, Estonia
27 April-1 May 1998
A C.1. P. Catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-0-7923-6440-5 ISBN 978-94-011-4132-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-011-4132-1
Printed an acid-free paper
AII Rights Reserved
© 2000 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 2000
No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by
any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright
owner.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface IX
Acknowledgements xi
Summary Poem Xlll
Introduction Xv
1. Oceanic freshwater fluxes in the climate system
Anders Stigebrandt
2. Global atmospheric circulation patterns and relationships to Arctic
freshwater fluxes
J.E. Walsh 21
3. Atmospheric components of the Arctic Ocean freshwater balance and their
interannual variability
e.
R. G. Barry and M Serreze 45
4. Hydroclimatology of the Arctic ~ainage basin
L.e. Bowling, D.P. Lettenmaier and B. V. Matheussen 57
5. The Arctic Ocean's freshwater budget: sources, storage and export
e.
Eddy Carmack 91
6. The Arctic ocean freshwater budget of a climate General Circulation Model
Howard Vattle and Douglas Cresswell 127
7. Atmospheric components of the Arctic Ocean hydrologic budget assessed
from Rawinsonde data
Me. Serreze and R. G. Barry 141
8. Reanalyses depictions of the Arctic atmospheric moisture budget
D.H. Bromwich, R.I. Cullather and Me. Serreze 163
9. Moisture transport to Arctic drainage basins relating to significant
precipitation events and cyclogenesis
John R. Gyakum 197
10. Atmospheric climate models: simulation of the Arctic Ocean fresh water
budget components
V.M Kattsov, J.E. Walsh, A. Rinke and K. Dethloff 209
vi
11. Discharge observation networks in Arctic regions: computation of the river
runoff into the Arctic Ocean, its seasonality and variability
WE. Crabs, F. Portmann and T. de Couet 249
12. Arctic river flow: a review of contributing areas
T.D. Prowse and P.o. Flegg 269
13. The dynamics of river water inflow to the Arctic Ocean
I.A. Shiklomanov, A.!, Shiklomanov, R.B. Lammers, B.J. Peterson and
c.J. Vorosmarty 281
14. River input of water, sediment, major ions, nutrients and trace metals from
Russian territory to the Arctic Ocean
v. v.
Gordeev 297
15. The dispersion of Siberian river flows into coastal waters: meteorological,
hydrological and hydrochemical aspects
I.P. Semiletov, NI. Savelieva, G.E. Weller, l./. Pipko, S.P. Pugach,
A. Yu. Gukov and L.N Vasilevskaya 323
16. The variable climate of the Mackenzie River basin: its water cycle and fresh
water discharge
R.E. Stewart 367
17. Arctic estuaries and ice: a positive-negative estuarine couple
R. W Macdonald 383
18. Satellite views of the Arctic Ocean freshwater balance
D.A. Rothrock, R. Kwok and D. Groves 409
19. Tracer studies of the Arctic freshwater budget
P. Schlosser, B. Ekwurzel, S. Khatiwala, B. Newton, W Maslowski and
S. Pfirman 453
20. Exchanges of freshwater through the shallow straits of the North American
Arctic
Humfrey Melling 479
21. The transformations of Atlantic water in the Arctic Ocean and their
significance for the freshwater budget
Bert Rudels and Hans J. Friedrich 503
22. Modelling the variability of exchanges between the Arctic Ocean and the
Nordic seas
Rudiger Gerdes 533
vii
23. Sea ice growth, melt and modeling: a survey
Michael Steele and Gregory M. Flato 533
24. Fresh water freezing/melting cycle in the Arctic Ocean
G. V. Alekseev, L. V. Bulatov and V.F. Zakharov 589
Colour Plates 609
Subject Index 621
PREFACE
Following a decision by the Arctic Ocean Sciences Board (AOSB) in July 1996
the then chainnan, Geoffrey Holland, wrote a letter of invitation to a meeting to plan a
"Symposium on the Freshwater Balance of the Arctic". The meeting was held in Ottawa
on November 12-13 1996 and was attended by representatives of various organisations,
including the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), as well as individual scientists.
Results of this meeting included:
• Co-sponsorship with AOSB by the Scientific Committee on Ocean Research
(SCOR), the Arctic Climate System Study (ACSYS) and the Global Energy and
Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX).
• A decision to apply for funding as a Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) of the
North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) Scientific Affairs Division.
• That expenses would be covered in part by funds available through an existing NSF
grant to the SCOR Executive offices in Baltimore, MD.
• The appointment of myself to be Chairman/Manager for the Symposium.
• Provision of a recommended list of Scientific Advisors to assist the Chainnan in
selecting key speakers.
NATO ARWs have to follow clear guidelines. They require a balance between
numbers of attendees from NATO countries and Cooperation Partner (CP) countries,
which consist mainly of states of the Russian Federation and Eastern Europe. The key
speakers at the AR W must be identified in the application for funding and the total
attendance is limited and by invitation only. Nonnally it must be held in a CP country
and co-directors are required, one each from a NATO and a CP country: Dr. Igor
Shiklomanov, Director of the State Hydrological Institute, St. Petersburg. Russian
Federation, agreed to act with me in this role. The Proceedings must be published in
bookfonn.
Application for NATO funding was made in May 1997 under the heading "The
Freshwater Budget of the Arctic Ocean" with the meeting to be held in Tallinn, the
capital of Estonia. At the same time SCOR agreed to provide administrative support,
especially for making speakers' travel arrangements. Approval was received from NATO
in September 1997. With funding assured, definite invitations went out to potential key
speakers and speakers. It was decided to try and make the book not merely a conference
"Proceedings", but a text on the topic, a status report for 1998. To ensure coverage,
invited attendees were carefully selected by area of expertise as well as reputation and, as
NATO funds covered all a speaker's expenses, it was thought appropriate to propose a
tentative title for the paper. To provide as wide a view as possible, it was suggested that
principal authors should incorporate contributions from their colleagues into the final
text. A glance at the authors' listing at the head of many of the papers will show the
success of this policy.
In October 1997 I traveled to Tallinn. An introduction to the Estonian Marine
Institute (EMI) and its staff was provided through the good offices of Dr.Penti Malkki,
Director of the Finnish Institute of Marine Research, Helsinki. From that time on my
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main contact in Estonia was Dr. JUri Elken of EM! who accepted the position of
Chainnan of the local arrangements committee. His help was invaluable. Hotels with
facilities adequate for the meeting were visited and an agreement entered into with the
Hotel Vim. It was becoming clear that the Editor needed help to provide adequate
assessments and criticisms of the papers. Subjects ranged from river hydrology through
meteorology and ocean physicS/chemistry to modelling of air-ice-ocean interface
processes: data collection methods and their limitations were also discussed. It was
indeed fortunate that the four Associate Editors listed on the title page agreed to help.
Between us, we possessed adequate knowledge and each paper was assigned to a suitable
Associate Editor for assessment before coming on to me for final comments.
NATO ARW No. 971307, "The Freshwater Budget of the Arctic Ocean", was
held at the Hotel Vim, Vim Valjak 4, EEOOOI, Tallinn, Estonia, on the five days April
27 -May 1, 1998 inclusive. Most attendees arrived on the evening of Saturday, 25 April,
which gave the North Americans a day to recover from the time shift before commencing
work. This meeting was not advertised, but knowledge of it spread by mouth, and the
topic and its timeliness was such that it proved impossible to invite all those who wished
to come. In addition to the forty-three scientists who attended with all expenses paid, an
additional seven came as auditors, covering all their own costs. This brought the total up
to fifty, the maximum allowed by the NATO guidelines. An ARW office was established
in the Hotel Vim, which served for typing, photocopying, travel arrangements and all
liason with the Hotel staff. Presentations were organised so that on Monday, after
welcoming addresses, key speakers gave some of the more general background papers. In
the following four days topics were arranged to progress from studies of the freshwater
inputs to the Arctic ocean to descriptions of its distribution and redistribution within the
ocean to estimates of oceanic import/export of water and ice through the straits joining
the Arctic to the World ocean. The Editors led discussions after each related group of
papers had been presented.
It was some twenty months after Tallinn that the final manuscripts came to
hand, a time of frustration to those who completed their manuscripts before the end of
1998. In the November of that year all five Editors met for four days in Cambridge u.K.
when papers to hand were read, discussed, and an initial response made to each principal
author. Revised versions came in to individual Editors, who made further comment, but
by the summer of 1999 most of the papers were in near-final form. Some papers were
still absent at the end of the year and it was decided that only twenty-three of the twenty
seven papers given in Tallinn would be published. Attempts to cope with the inevitable
gap are the short paper by an Associate Editor (prowse) and Flegg and reference to
recently published Journal papers in the Introduction. Very many authors, informed of
the closing date, provided final updated versions of their work. As a result, it is thought
that the present volume describes of our state of knowledge in 1999 on the Freshwater
Budget of the Arctic Ocean.
Victoria B.C. Feb. 2000 E. LynLewis
ACKNOWLEGDEMENTS
This book originated in a decision by Mr. G. Holland and his colleagues in the
AOSB at their meeting in Helsinki in April 1996. Since that time the importance of
freshwater in the Arctic Ocean to climate has become more and more apparent and the
perspicacity of the AOSB choice a matter for congratulation.
My debt to my four Associates is profound and difficult to exaggerate. Dr. E.
Peter Jones of the Ocean Science Division, Bedford Institute of Oceanography,
Dartmouth N.S. Canada; Prof. Dr. Peter Lemke, Director, Institut fur Meereskunde,
Kiel, Germany; Dr. Terry D. Prowse, National Water Research Institute, Saskatoon, SK,
Canada; Dr. Peter Wadhams, Reader in Polar studies, Scott Polar Research Institute,
University of Cambridge U.K. Most polar scientists reading this book will be familiar
with these men and their work. In addition to their direct influence on authors, it was of
great value to have such knowledgeable people as consultants when initial, tentative
conclusions needed confirmation.
In Tallinn, the Chairman of the Local Arrangements Committee, Dr. JUri Elken
gave much of his time to organising the meeting. Quite literally all communications
within Estonia had to pass through his hands as Estonian is a non - Indo-European
language and was opaque to all other organisers. In addition to thanking him for a first
class job I wish to apologise; he suffered from having far to many E-mails from this
office. Sometimes I think that his accomplishment was in spite of me and my detailed
requests.
Dr. L. Veiga da Cunha of the NATO Scientific and Environmental Affairs
Division was my correspondent in all matters dealing with this ARW and was in Tallinn
for the greater part of our meeting. He has now left that office, but leaves a memory of
the efficient way in which he dealt with administrative problems.
It is very pleasant to recall my contacts with the Executive Director of SCOR,
Ms. E Gross. She offered encouragement and understanding, coped with my rudimentary
accountancy, and advised on how to serve the interests of science and administration
simultaneously. Her assistant Ms. W. A. Ross dealt effectively with the myriad practical
details.
I want to thank individuals whose help at the Viru Hotel had a material affect
on our meeting. Dr Vladimir Kattsov used his fluent knowledge of English to provide a
simultaneous translation of some of his compatriots' presentations and so made them
immediately available to the rest of the audience. It has been said that the basis of a good
conference is well-housed and fed delegates and a smoothly running administration. My
wife, Khidia, was responsible for all the day to day "housekeeping" details, from meeting
people at the airport, to running the office, to coping with any and all problems within
the hotel, to making and altering travel arrangements. My sister Susan did all the
necessary typing.
Financial support was supplied by the U.S. National Science Foundation under
its Grant No.OCE - 9422144 to SCOR. Environ. ARW 971307 was the designation of
the support received from the NATO Scientific and Environmental Affairs Division.
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