Changes in mean flow and atmospheric wave activity in the North Atlantic sector

• Published in: Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society
• Main Authors: Paeth, Heiko, Pollinger, Felix
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2019
• Subjects: North Atlantic; North Atlantic oscillation; Northwest Atlantic
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/qj.3660; https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1002%2Fqj.3660; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/qj.3660; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/qj.3660; https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/qj.3660

Abstract In recent years, the midlatitudes are characterized by more intense heatwaves in summer and sometimes severe cold spells in winter that might emanate from changes in atmospheric circulation, including synoptic‐scale and planetary wave activity in the midlatitudes. In this study, we investigate the heat and momentum exchange between the mean flow and atmospheric waves in the North Atlantic sector and adjacent continents by means of the physically consistent Eliassen–Palm flux diagnostics applied to reanalysis and forced climate model data. In the long‐term mean, momentum is transferred from the mean flow to atmospheric waves in the northwest Atlantic region, where cyclogenesis prevails. Further downstream over Europe, eddy fluxes return momentum to the mean flow, sustaining the jet stream against friction. A global climate model is able to reproduce this pattern with high accuracy. Atmospheric variability related to atmospheric wave activity is much more expressed at the intraseasonal rather than the interannual time‐scale. Over the last 40 years, reanalyses reveal a northward shift of the jet stream and a weakening of intraseasonal weather variability related to synoptic‐scale and planetary wave activity. This pertains to the winter and summer seasons, especially over central Europe, and correlates with changes in the North Atlantic Oscillation as well as regional temperature and precipitation. A very similar phenomenon is found in a climate model simulation with business‐as‐usual scenario, suggesting an anthropogenic trigger in the weakening of intraseasonal weather variability in the midlatitudes.