Seasonal and interannual variability of carbon cycle in South China Sea: A three-dimensional physical-biogeochemical modeling study

Abstract

The South China Sea (SCS) exhibits strong variations on seasonal to interannual time scale, and the changing Southeast Asian Monsoon has direct impacts on the nutrients and phytoplankton dynamics, as well as the carbon cycle. A Pacific basin-wide physical-biogeochemical model has been developed and used to investigate the physical variations, ecosystem responses, and carbon cycle consequences. The Pacific basin-wide circulation model, based on the Regional Ocean Model Systems (ROMS) with a 50-km spatial resolution, is driven with daily air-sea fluxes derived from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) reanalysis between 1990 and 2004. The biogeochemical processes are simulated with the Carbon, Si(OH)4, Nitrogen Ecosystem (CoSINE) model consisting of multiple nutrients and plankton functional groups and detailed carbon cycle dynamics. The ROMS-CoSINE model is capable of reproducing many observed features and their variability over the same period at the SouthEast Asian Time-series Study (SEATS) station in the SCS. The integrated air-sea CO2 flux over the entire SCS reveals a strong seasonal cycle, serving as a source of CO2 to the atmosphere in spring, summer and autumn, but acting as a sink of CO2 for the atmosphere in winter. The annual mean sea-to-air CO2 flux averaged over the entire SCS is +0.33 moles CO2 m−2year−1, which indicates that the SCS is a weak source of CO2 to the atmosphere. Temperature has a stronger influence on the seasonal variation of pCO2 than biological activity, and is thus the dominant factor controlling the oceanic pCO2 in the SCS. The water temperature, seasonal upwelling and Kuroshio intrusion determine the pCO2 differences at coast of Vietnam and the northwestern region of the Luzon Island. The inverse relationship between the interannual variability of Chl-a in summer near the coast of Vietnam and NINO3 SST (Sea Surface Temperature) index in January implies that the carbon cycle and primary productivity in the SCS is teleconnected to the Pacific-East Asian large-scale climatic variability.