Pacific dominance to global air-sea CO2 flux variability: A novel atmospheric inversion agrees with ocean models

We address an ongoing debate regarding the geographic distribution of interannual variability in ocean-atmosphere carbon exchange. We find that, for 1983-1998, both novel high-resolution atmospheric inversion calculations and global ocean biogeochemical models place the primary source of global CO2...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Geophysical Research Letters
Main Authors: McKinley, GA, Rodenbeck, C, Gloor, M, Houweling, S, Heimann, M
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:unknown
Published: 2004
Subjects:
Online Access:https://research.vu.nl/en/publications/522f0585-97d4-499a-b739-28d4b5de4d2c
https://doi.org/10.1029/2004GL021069
https://hdl.handle.net/1871.1/522f0585-97d4-499a-b739-28d4b5de4d2c
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Summary:We address an ongoing debate regarding the geographic distribution of interannual variability in ocean-atmosphere carbon exchange. We find that, for 1983-1998, both novel high-resolution atmospheric inversion calculations and global ocean biogeochemical models place the primary source of global CO2 air-sea flux variability in the Pacific Ocean. In the model considered here, this variability is clearly associated with the El Nino/Southern Oscillation cycle. Both methods also indicate that the Southern Ocean is the second-largest source of air-sea CO2 flux variability, and that variability is small throughout the Atlantic, including the North Atlantic, in contrast to previous studies.