Monthly Sea Surface Temperature (SST) Means from Daily Data, Optimum Interpolation Sea Surface Temperature (OISST V2) ...

• Main Authors: Reynolds, Richard W., Rayner, Nick A., Smith, Thomas M., Stokes, Diane C., Wang, Wanqiu
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: NSF Arctic Data Center 2002
• Subjects: Arctic Report Card 2023; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.18739/a2bz61971; https://arcticdata.io/catalog/view/doi:10.18739/A2BZ61971

A weekly 18 spatial resolution optimum interpolation (OI) sea surface temperature (SST) analysis has been produced at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) using both in situ and satellite data from November 1981 to the present. The weekly product has been available since 1993 and is widely used for weather and climate monitoring and forecasting. Errors in the satellite bias correction and the sea ice to SST conversion algorithm are discussed, and then an improved version of the OI analysis is developed. The changes result in a modest reduction in the satellite bias that leaves small global residual biases of roughly 20.038 degrees Celsius (C). The major improvement in the analysis occurs at high latitudes due to the new sea ice algorithm where local differences between the old and new analysis can exceed 18 C. Comparisons with other SST products are needed to determine the consistency of the OI. These comparisons show that the differences among products occur on large time- and space ...