Comment on os-2022-2

Abstract

This paper and associated software implement the Thermodynamic Equation Of Seawater – 2010 (TEOS-10) in EXCEL for an expedite estimation of absolute salinity (SA), conservative temperature (Θ) and derived thermodynamic properties of seawater – potential density (σΘ), in situ density (ρSA, Θ, p) and sound speed (c). Vertical profile template plots for these parameters are included, as well as a SA – Θ diagram template, which includes plotting of the density field (computation of user selected σΘ lines is included). Estimation of absolute salinity relies on the interpolation of data from casts of seawater from the world ocean (IOC, SCOR and IAPSO, 2010), and the EXCEL workbook introduced here (TEOS-10 EXCEL, available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4763574) includes a subset of the TEOS-10 look-up tables necessary for this estimation, namely the salinity anomaly [deltaSA_ref] and the absolute salinity anomaly ratio [SAAR_ref] look-up tables. As the user simply needs to paste new data into the spreadsheet to automatically compute the oceanographic parameters referred above, this tool may prove to be extremely useful among all who are not comfortable of using the full-featured TEOS-10 programming language environments (e.g., MATLAB, FORTRAN), but rather need a simpler way of computing fundamental properties of seawater (e.g., density, sound speed), while adhering to current standards. Returned values are the same (up to 15 decimal places, i.e., difference = 0.000000000000000), as the ones obtained with the MATLAB version of the GSW (Gibbs Sea Water) toolbox (McDougall and Barker, 2011) available at the TEOS-10 website (https://www.teos-10.org). This paper describes the EXCEL workbook, its use, and the included VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) functions. Quality control against the GSW toolbox is also addressed, namely issues detected with the interpolated values returned by the toolbox when there are missing values in the reference look-up table. In these situations, the GSW toolbox replaces missing values with a level pressure horizontal interpolation of neighbour points, while it is clear from the testing results that vertical interpolation, which was then implemented in TEOS-10 EXCEL, returns a more robust solution (figs. 9 and 10).