Monitoring local Ocean Heat Content changes with satellite altimetry and space gravimetry to assess the variability of the Meridional Heat Transport in the North Atlantic: the 4DATLANTIC-OHC Project

Abstract

Given the major role of the Atlantic Ocean meridional heat transport in the climate system, it is essential to characterize its temporal variations at different locations. The 4DATLANTIC-OHC Project (https://eo4society.esa.int/projects/4datlantic-ohc/) aims at developing and testing space geodetic methods based on satellite altimetry and space gravimetry to estimate the local ocean heat content (OHC) changes over the Atlantic Ocean. Combined with independent estimates of the surface heat fluxes this approach holds promise to estimate the Atlantic Meridional Heat Transport (MHT) at any section across the Atlantic basin. The official version 1.0 of the 4DAtlantic-OHC product has been released, it provides estimates of local changes in OHC with their uncertainties. This product is accessible with DOI https://doi.org/10.24400/527896/A01-2022.012  and can be downloaded on AVISO portal. At two test sites, OHC changes derived from in situ data (RAPID and OVIDE) are used to evaluate the accuracy and reliability of the new space geodetic based OHC change estimate. Combined with ERA5 estimate of the surface heat fluxes, the Atlantic OHC product will be used to derive an energy budget of the North Atlantic basin and estimate the associated divergence in ocean heat transport. From the divergence field we will derive at the end of the project new estimates of the Atlantic meridional heat transport at different sections in the North Atlantic basin (RAPID and OSNAP sections) and compare it with in situ estimates. The V1.0 of 4DAtlantic-OHC products over the Atlantic Ocean, the evaluation results of the OHC against in situ data and preliminary results of MHT estimation will be presented.