Abstract
We compare the representation of the Arctic liquid and solid freshwater volumes, and their transports to/from the Arctic, using simulations with different ocean and atmosphere model resolutions from models participating in the EU H2020 PRIMAVERA project. Regarding ocean resolution, we find less liquid freshwater in the central Arctic Ocean and more in the Kara and Laptev seas in the model simulations at higher resolution compared with the model simulations at lower resolution. The mean sea ice thickness does not show a systematic behaviour across models regarding model resolution increase. In terms of atmospheric resolution, we find that both liquid freshwater and mean sea ice thickness decrease when the resolution of the atmospheric model increases. We also analyze differences of Arctic liquid freshwater volume and mean sea ice thickness caused by pre-industrial and historical atmospheric forcings. Pre-industrial simulations show less freshwater volume and increased mean sea ice thickness and export from the Arctic compared with present day simulations. Finally, we find an increasing impact of Arctic freshwater export on North Atlantic convection with increased atmospheric resolution.
Highlights
Freshwater in the Arctic Ocean plays an important role in the global climate system
When low and high ocean resolution simulations (ORCA1 minus ORCA025) are compared, we find that low resolution shows larger freshwater content (FWC) over the Central Arctic Ocean and lower FWC over the Kara and Laptev Seas compared with high resolution (Fig. 3a–c), EC-Earth3.1 showing the largest difference
Models participating in the H2020 Primavera project were used to analyse the impact of changes in atmospheric and ocean resolutions on the Arctic freshwater budget
Summary
Cold liquid freshwater forms a thin surface layer in the Arctic Ocean that separates the warmer water below from the sea ice and the atmosphere. The largest source of sea ice export is across the Fram Strait and amounts from 2400 up to 3200 km year−1 (Vinje et al 1998; Vinje 2001; Aagaard and Carmack 1989; Schmith and Hansen 2003) This amount of freshwater export as ice, is comparable with the liquid freshwater export; ice export is much more dependent on atmospheric dynamics, due to its confinement to the sea surface. This article intends to provide the state of knowledge of the resolution dependency of the Arctic freshwater content and its export across different straits
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