Evaluation of air-sea sensible and latent heat fluxes over the Japan Sea obtained from satellite, atmospheric reanalysis, and objective analysis products

Abstract

In order to evaluate the air-sea sensible and latent heat fluxes (SHF and LHF, respectively) over the Japan Sea obtained from satellite-derived, atmospheric reanalysis, and objective analysis products, we conducted an intercomparison of climatological monthly mean fields and a validation of the daily means with in situ observations. As a result, we found significant differences in the climatological mean fields of SHF in products during the winter. The SHF values from the Japanese Ocean Flux Data Sets with Use of Remote Sensing Observations version 2 (J-OFURO2) showed finer-scale spatial structures, large values near the coastal regions, and small values over the center of the Japan Sea. From a comparison with in situ observations, we concluded that J-OFURO2 SHF has better performance compared with the other global products. The differences in LHF in the products are not so large compared with the results for SHF. However, in a comparison between the satellite-derived products and the others, the representations of the frontal features associated with the sub-polar front and the Tsushima warm current were different. A comparison in the near-coastal region showed that application of the creeping-sea-fill technique used in J-OFURO2 provided appropriate data in the region and succeeded in reducing the adverse effects from land contamination encountered when using coarse atmospheric reanalysis data.