Abstract
The air-sea gas exchange of CO 2 is a complex function of the sea surface temperature, biological production etc. which fluctuates greatly on a seasonal timescale. However, in a condensed fashion the flux can be written as F = α( C W T − C Eq ), where F is the mean CO 2 flux for one year, α is an exchange coefficient, C W T is the winter mixed layer concentration of the total dissolved inorganic carbonate and C Eq is the equilibrium concentration (of C W T ) corresponding to the prevailing atmospheric CO 2 pressure. We use an one dimensional physical-biological-chemical model (designed for station M in the Norwegian Sea) to determine the values of α and C Eq . Knowing α and C Eq we can design a simple model for the air-sea gas exchange in the Greenland-Iceland-Norwegian (GIN) sea. The main assumption is that the upper ocean water goes through several annual cycles before it forms deep water, i.e., looses contact with the atmosphere. The model implies that the C W T concentration in the upper waters of the GIN sea is strongly correlated with the winter mixed layer temperature, T W , and observations verify this assumption. According to this study, the GIN sea receives 0.11±0.04 GtC/yr from the air-sea gas exchange.
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