Controls of CO2 sources and sinks in the earth scale surface ocean - Temperature and nutrients

• Main Authors: Volk, Tyler, Liu, Zhongze
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: 1988
• Subjects: 48; Pacific; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=19890052481

Several regions in the ocean in which disequilibrium persists on an annual avarage between CO2 in the surface water and the overlying atmosphere were examined using various models in which CO2 does cycle in a steady state at which sources (ocean outgassing) and sinks (ingassing) are in balance. The relative values of the surface temperature and surface nutrients, the two major contributors to the CO2 source and/or sink properties, are determined. Results from models with two ocean surfaces indicate that the sink in the north Atlantic and the sources in the equatorial Atlantic and Pacific are all dominated by the global temperature patterns. Results from ocean models with three surface zones show that, in the equatorial Pacific, the temperature control is responsible for over 50 percent (and, possibly, for almost 70 percent) of the CO2 outgassing, with the balance coming from the earth scale surface nutrient structure.