Abstract
Abstract. Earth System Climate Models (ESCMs) are valuable tools that can be used to gain a better understanding of the climate system, global biogeochemical cycles and how anthropogenically-driven changes may affect them. Here we describe improvements made to the marine biogeochemical ecosystem component of the University of Victoria's ESCM (version 2.9). Major changes include corrections to the code and equations describing phytoplankton light limitation and zooplankton grazing, the implementation of a more realistic zooplankton growth and grazing model, and the implementation of an iron limitation scheme to constrain phytoplankton growth. The new model is evaluated after a 10 000-yr spin-up and compared to both the previous version and observations. For the majority of biogeochemical tracers and ecosystem processes the new model shows significant improvements when compared to the previous version and evaluated against observations. Many of the improvements are due to better simulation of seasonal changes in higher latitude ecosystems and the effect that this has on ocean biogeochemistry. This improved model is intended to provide a basic new ESCM model component, which can be used as is or expanded upon (i.e., the addition of new tracers), for climate change and biogeochemical cycling research.
Highlights
The oceans have a large effect on the Earth’s climate and play an important role in global biogeochemical cycles
Earth System Climate Models (ESCMs) are valuable tools that can be used to gain a better understanding of the climate system, global biogeochemical cycles and how anthropogenically-driven changes may affect them
Marine ecosystems affect the climate primarily through the “carbonate” and “soft tissue” pumps (Longhurst and Harrison, 1989; Volk and Hoffert, 1985). These pumps work through the biological uptake of carbon in the surface ocean and the subsequent transport of the small fraction of it that is not recycled along the way to the deep ocean, where it is unable to affect the climate for hundreds to thousands of years
Summary
The oceans have a large effect on the Earth’s climate and play an important role in global biogeochemical cycles. Marine ecosystems effect global biogeochemical cycles in a number of ways As mentioned above, they play an important role in the carbon cycle through the uptake, recycling and sequestration of some CO2. In surface waters nitrogen and phosphorus are major nutrients that are consumed by, and drive, primary production (PP) and, are linked to the carbon cycle Since these nutrients often limit PP their availability can, influence the climate system by controlling the magnitude and location of biological pump processes. Chemical and biological processes are temperature dependent, these changes have had an effect on many marine ecosystem processes This has, in turn, affected the ocean’s role in the Earth’s climate system and global biogeochemical cycles (often through feedback effects). Our improvements to the marine ecosystem component of the University of Victoria Earth System Climate Model (UVic ESCM) are designed to correct previous errors, add more realistic processes, and provide a basic platform for future applications
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