William R. Holland

The Role of Mesoscale Eddies in the General Circulation of the Ocean—Numerical Experiments Using a Wind-Driven Quasi-Geostrophic Model

Abstract Results from a two-layer, quasi-geostrophic, general circulation model of the ocean with fine horizontal resolution are presented. As in Holland and Lin (1975a.b), mesoscale eddies spontaneously arise due to instabilities in the oceanic currents, giving rise to transient oceanic circulations that reach a statistical equilibrium. In these final equilibrium states, the interaction of the eddy field with the mean state is examined, and it is shown that the eddies determine the character of the large-scale mean flow. In particular, the eddies act to limit the amplitude of the mean flow in the upper ocean, are responsible for a downward energy propagation that fills the deep sea with eddy energy, and create a downward momentum flux which is responsible for the creation of deep, time-mean, abyssal gyres that are an important component of the vertically averaged mass transport in the ocean. Three new aspects of the mesoscale eddy problem are discussed. First, the Holland and Lin (1975a,b) results are ex...

The NCAR Climate System Model Global Ocean Component

This paper describes the global ocean component of the NCAR Climate System Model. New parameterizations of the effects of mesoscale eddies and of the upper-ocean boundary layer are included. Numerical improvements include a third-order upwind advection scheme and elimination of the artificial North Pole island in the original MOM 1.1 code. Updated forcing fields are used to drive the ocean-alone solution, which is integrated long enough so that it is in equilibrium. The ocean transports and potential temperature and salinity distributions are compared with observations. The solution sensitivity to the freshwater forcing distribution is highlighted, and the sensitivity to resolution is also briefly discussed.

On the Generation of Mesoscale Eddies and their Contribution to the OceanicGeneral Circulation. I. A Preliminary Numerical Experiment

Abstract Numerical experiments on the wind-driven ocean circulation in a closed basin show that mesoscale eddiescan appear spontaneously during the integration of the equations of motion for a baroclinic ocean. For somevalues of the basic parameters governing the flow, the solutions reach a steady state while for other valuesfinite-amplitude eddies remain a part of the final statistically steady state. In the eddying cases the solutionscan be regarded as a mean flow upon which is superimposed a set of eddies which propagate westward at afew kilometers per day. The eddies typically have horizontal wavelengths of a few hundred kilometers. Analyses of die energetics show the eddies to be generated by the process of baroclinic instability. Thepotential energy of the mean flow is released to supply energy to the eddies. The computed Reynoldsstresses, while small compared to the terms in the geostrophic balance of the mean momentum equations, dohave a strong influence on the mean circulation and, in fact, the d...

An Example of Eddy-Induced Ocean Circulation

Abstract Gyre scale and local vorticity balances are examined for a single numerical experiment designed to elucidate the role of eddies in the oceanic general circulation. Due to the complex nature of the flow, a combination of different analyses is needed. In particular the mean potential vorticity fields are calculated and related to local and global vorticity fluxes. The nature of eddy generation and decay is discussed in terms of eddy enstrophy balances in the fluid. Momentum balances in various parts of the gyre are deduced through the application of the circulation theorem. Fields of eddy diffusivity for the mixing of potential vorticity and heat are determined. The applicability of Sverdrup dynamics in various parts of the fluid and the manner in which the deep abyssal gyres are driven are examined. The net picture is a complex but consistent one. In the upper layer, eddy generation occurs in the separation region of the eastward jet and in the region of westward return flow. Eddy decay occurs pri...

Baroclinic and topographic influences on the transport in western boundary currents

Abstract One of the central unsolved theoretical problems of the large scale ocean circulation is concerned with explaining the very large transports measured in western boundary currents such as the Gulf Stream and the Kuroshio. The only theory up to now that can explain the size of these transports is that of non-linear recirculation in which the advective terms in the momentum equations became important near the western boundary. In this paper an alternative explanation is suggested. When bottom topography and baroclinic effects are included in a wind-driven ocean model it is shown that the western boundary current can have a transport larger than that predicted from the wind stress distribution even when the nonlinear advective terms are ignored. The explanation lies in the presence of pressure torques associated with bottom topography which can contribute to the vorticity balance in the same sense as the wind stress curl. Three numerical experiments have been carried out to explore the nature of this...

A description of numerical antarctic circumpolar currents

Abstract A sequence of numerical calculations has been made for the equilibrium balances of eddies and mean currents in open and partially blocked, periodic channels. The physical model employed is a two-layer, quasigeostrophic, wind-driven one, with important bottom friction and weak lateral friction. The resolved eddies provide the interior fluxes of momentum and potential vorticity which allow the mean state to be a balanced one. The set of calculations does not provide a parameter study as such, but does provide examples of the influences of alternative physical processes and geometrical constraints. These alternatives include the presence or absence of a partial barrier across the channel, the length of the channel, the addition of a transient component to the wind-driving, and the addition of a topographic sill across the channel gap. Particular attention is focused upon the steadily driven general circulation of a β-plane channel, because of the structural simplicity of the solution. The results may be broadly summarized as follows. The eddies are generated by a baroclinic instability of the mean flow. They act to intensity the upper layer mean jet and mean cross-jet potential vorticity gradient (through eddy horizontal Reynolds stress and relative vorticity flux divergence, respectively) and to transfer downwards mean zonal momentum, energy, and potential vorticity gradient (through eddy interfacial pressure drag, vertical pressure work, and vortex stretching flux divergence, respectively). In the case of a zonally uniform channel, the meridional heat flux is found not to conform closely to previously proposed parameterizations. The presence of a partial meridional barrier and a topographic obstacle are found to strongly influence the equilibrium solution, while neither a change in the basin length nor the presence of a transient wind component appear to importantly alter the solution.

An overlooked problem in model simulations of the thermohaline circulation and heat transport in the Atlantic Ocean

Abstract Many models of the large-scale thermohaline circulation in the ocean exhibit strong zonally integrated upwelling in the midlatitude North Atlantic that significantly decreases the amount of deep water that is carried from the formation regions in the subpolar North Atlantic toward low latitudes and across the equator. In an analysis of results from the Community Modeling Effort using a suite of models with different horizontal resolution, wind and thermohaline forcing, and mixing parameters, it is shown that the upwelling is always concentrated in the western boundary layer between roughly 30° and 40°N. The vertical transport across 1000 m appears to be controlled by local dynamics and strongly depends on the horizontal resolution and mixing parameters of the model. It is suggested that in models with a realistic deep-water formation rate in the subpolar North Atlantic, the excessive upwelling can be considered as the prime reason for the typically too low meridional overturning rates and northwa...

Deep-water formation and meridional overturning in a high-resolution model of the North Atlantic

The authors use different versions of the model of the wind- and thermohaline-driven circulation in the North and Equatorial Atlantic developed under the WOCE Community Modeling Effort to investigate the mean flow pattern and deep-water formation in the subpolar region, and the corresponding structure of the basin-scale meridional overturning circulation transport. A suite of model experiments has been carded out in recent years, differing in horizontal resolution (1° × 1.2°, 1/3° × 0.4°, 1/6° × 0.2°), thermohaline boundary conditions, and parameterization of small-scale mixing. The mass transport in the subpolar gyre and the production of North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) appears to be essentially controlled by the outflow of dense water from the Greenland and Norwegian Seas. in the present model simulated by restoring conditions in a buffer zone adjacent to the boundary near the Greenland–Scotland Ridge. Deep winter convection homogenizes the water column in the center of the Labrador Sea to about 2000 m. The water mass properties (potential temperature about 3°C, salinity about 34.9 psu) and the volume (1.1×1053 km3) of the homogenized water are in fair agreement with observations. The convective mixing has only little effect on the net sinking of upper-layer water in the subpolar gyre. Sensitivity experiments show that the export of NADW from the subpolar North Atlantic is more strongly affected by changes in the overflow conditions than by changes in the surface buoyancy fluxes over the Labrador and Irminger Seas, even if these suppress the deep convection completely. The host of sensitivity experiments demonstrates that realistic meridional overturning and heat transport distributions for the North Atlantic (with a maximum of 1 PW) can be obtained with NADW production rates of 15–16 Sv, provided the spurious upwelling of deep water that characterizes many model solutions in the Gulf Stream regime is avoided by adequate horizontal resolution add mixing parameterization.

Application of a Third-Order Upwind Scheme in the NCAR Ocean Model*

Abstract The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Ocean Model has been developed for use in NCAR’s Climate System Modeling project, a comprehensive development of a coupled ocean–atmosphere–sea ice–land surface model of the global climate system. As part of this development, new parameterizations of diffusive mixing by unresolved processes have been implemented for the tracer equations in the model. Because the strength of the mixing depends upon the density structure under these parameterizations, it is possible that local explicit mixing may be quite small in selected locations, in contrast to the constant diffusivity model generally used. When a spatially centered advection scheme is used in the standard model configuration, local overshooting of tracer values occurs, leading to unphysical maxima and minima in the fields. While the immediate problem is a local Gibbs’s phenomenon, there is the possibility that such local tracer anomalies might propagate by advection and diffusion far from the...

A Numerical Calculation of the Circulation in the North Atlantic Ocean

Abstract A series of numerical experiments are carried out to simulate the three-dimensional circulation in the North Atlantic Ocean and to examine the dynamics therein. The calculations are partly diagnostic in that the density field is not predicted but is given from observations. The main predicted quantities are the velocity and pressure fields. The results of the basic experiment are compared with observations. The surface currents are quite similar to observations based upon ship drift data, and the surface pressure field is nearly identical to the height of the free surface constructed from a level-of-no-motion hypothesis. The deep pressure variations are nowhere flat or level, however, and the predicted deep currents are quite complex. They are, in fact, strongly controlled by bottom topography and tend to follow f/H contours, where f is the Coriolis parameter and H the depth. The Gulf Stream transport is quite large, reaching a maximum value of 81×106 m3 sec−1, despite the lack of important inert...