Tropical pacific and its global impacts

Abstract

This special issue of Theoretical and Applied Climatology is devoted to the tropical Pacific and its global impacts on climate processes. While it is widely accepted that the western tropical Pacific warm pool plays an important role in our climate system and for the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), little is known about the detailed dynamical processes that establish the meridional transport of heat and mass during ENSO events. This lack of indepth understanding inspired the Climate Variability and Predictability (CLIVAR) Pacific panel to organize an international workshop on Western Tropical Pacific: Hatchery for ENSO and Global Teleconnections in Guangzhou, China, from 26 to 28 November 2007, which was generously funded by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the National Natural Science Foundation of China, Guangzhou Association for Science and Technology, the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology/CAS, the First Institute of Oceanography/State Oceanic Administration People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Second Institute of Oceanography/State Oceanic Administration PRC, the AIPO973 Program (Ocean–Atmosphere Interaction over the Joining Area of Asia and Indian–Pacific Ocean and Its Impact on the Short-Term Climate Variation in China), World Climate Research Program, and US CLIVAR. All seven papers presented here were part of workshop. The workshop attracted about 80 scientists from 11 countries. The topics being discussed during the workshop include: the effects of the South China Sea on regional and large-scale climate, review of ongoing observational activities in the eastern equatorial Pacific and North Pacific, the interactions among the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO), ENSO, westerly wind bursts (WWB), and the mean state, long-term ENSO changes, predictability of ENSO, and the improvements in ENSO predictions and how ENSO predictions are actually used by societies. Important recommendations that were derived from this workshop include: