The role of mesoscale eddies in the rectification of the Southern ocean response to climate change

Abstract

Simulations from a fine-resolution global coupled model, the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Climate Model, version 2.4 (CM2.4), are presented, and the results are compared with a coarse version of the same coupled model, CM2.1, under idealized climate change scenarios. A particular focus is given to the dynamical response of the Southern Ocean and the role played by the eddies-parameterized or permitted- in setting the residual circulation and meridional density structure. Compared to the case in which eddies are parameterized and consistent with recent observational and idealized modeling studies, the eddy-permitting integrations of CM2.4 show that eddy activity is greatly energized with increasing mechanical and buoyancy forcings, buffering the ocean to atmospheric changes, and the magnitude of the residual oceanic circulation response is thus greatly reduced. Although compensation is far from being perfect, changes in poleward eddy fluxes partially compensate for the enhanced equatorward Ekman transport, leading to weak modifications in local isopycnal slopes, transport by the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, and overturning circulation. Since the presence of active ocean eddy dynamics buffers the oceanic response to atmospheric changes, the associated atmospheric response to those reduced ocean changes is also weakened. Further, it is hypothesized that present numerical approaches for the parameterization of eddy-induced transports could be too restrictive and prevent coarse-resolution models from faithfully representing the eddy response to variability and change in the forcing fields. © 2010 American Meteorological Society.