Role of the ocean mixed layer processes in the response of the North Pacific winter SST and MLD to global warming in CGCMs

Abstract

It is investigated how the changes of winter sea surface temperature (SST) and mixed layer depth (MLD) under climate change projections are predicted differently in the North Pacific depending on the coupled general circulation models (CGCMs), and how they are related to the dynamical property of the simulated ocean mixed layer. For this purpose the dataset from eleven CGCMs reported to IPCC’s AR4 are used, while detailed analysis is given to the MRI and MIROC models. Analysis of the CGCM data reveals that the increase of SST and the decrease of MLD in response to global warming tend to be smaller for the CGCM in which the ratio of ocean heat transport (OHT) to surface heat flux (SHF), R (=|OHT/SHF|), is larger in the heat budget of the mixed layer. The negative correlation is found between the changes of OHT and SHF under global warming, which may weaken the response to global warming in the CGCM with larger R. It is also found that the models with low horizontal resolution tend to give broader western boundary currents, larger R, and the smaller changes of SST and MLD under global warming.