An assessment of global and regional sea level for years 1993–2007 in a suite of interannual CORE-II simulations

• Published in: Ocean Modelling
• Main Authors: Griffies, Stephen M., Yin, Jianjun, Durack, Paul J., Goddard, Paul, Bates, Susan C., Behrens, Erik, Bentsen, Mats, Bi, Daohua, Biastoch, Arne, Boning, Claus W., Bozec, Alexandre, Chassignet, Eric, Danabasoglu, Gokhan, Danilov, Sergey, Domingues, Catia M., Drange, Helge, Farneti, Riccardo, Fernandez, Elodie, Greatbatch, Richard J., Holland, David M., Ilicak, Mehmet, Large, William G., Lorbacher, Katja, Lu, Jianhua, Marsland, Simon J., Mishra, Akhilesh, Nurser, A. J. George, Salas Y Melia, David, Palter, Jaime B., Samuels, Bonita L., Schroter, Jens, Schwarzkopf, Franziska U., Sidorenko, Dmitry, Treguier, Anne-Marie, Tseng, Yu-heng, Tsujino, Hiroyuki, Uotila, Petteri, Valcke, Sophie, Voldoire, Aurore, Qian, Wang, Winton, Michael, Zhang, Xuebin
• Other Authors: NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Department of Geosciences Tucson, University of Arizona, Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), National Center for Atmospheric Research Boulder (NCAR), Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (GEOMAR), Uni Research Climate, Uni Research Ltd, Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research (CAWCR), Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies (COAPS), Florida State University Tallahassee (FSU), Alfred-Wegener-Institut, Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (AWI), University of Bergen (UiB), Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics Trieste (ICTP), Centre Européen de Recherche et de Formation Avancée en Calcul Scientifique (CERFACS), CERFACS, New York University New York (NYU), NYU System (NYU), National Oceanography Centre Southampton (NOC), University of Southampton, Groupe d'étude de l'atmosphère météorologique (CNRM-GAME), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Météo France-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), McGill University = Université McGill Montréal, Canada, Laboratoire de physique des océans (LPO), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)-Université de Brest (UBO)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Meteorological Research Institute Tsukuba (MRI), Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research (CSIRO), Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation Canberra (CSIRO)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2014
• Subjects: Sea level; CORE global ocean-ice simulations; Steric sea level; Global sea level; Ocean heat content; [SDU.STU.OC]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Oceanography; Arctic; Pacific; North Atlantic; North Atlantic oscillation; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01132137; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocemod.2014.03.004

International audience We provide an assessment of sea level simulated in a suite of global ocean-sea ice models using the interannual CORE atmospheric state to determine surface ocean boundary buoyancy and momentum fluxes. These CORE-II simulations are compared amongst themselves as well as to observation-based estimates. We focus on the final 15 years of the simulations (1993–2007), as this is a period where the CORE-II atmospheric state is well sampled, and it allows us to compare sea level related fields to both satellite and in situ analyses. The ensemble mean of the CORE-II simulations broadly agree with various global and regional observation-based analyses during this period, though with the global mean thermosteric sea level rise biased low relative to observation-based analyses. The simulations reveal a positive trend in dynamic sea level in the west Pacific and negative trend in the east, with this trend arising from wind shifts and regional changes in upper 700 m ocean heat content. The models also exhibit a thermosteric sea level rise in the subpolar North Atlantic associated with a transition around 1995/1996 of the North Atlantic Oscillation to its negative phase, and the advection of warm subtropical waters into the subpolar gyre. Sea level trends are predominantly associated with steric trends, with thermosteric effects generally far larger than halosteric effects, except in the Arctic and North Atlantic. There is a general anti-correlation between thermosteric and halosteric effects for much of the World Ocean, associated with density compensated changes.