CARINA TCO2 data in the Atlantic Ocean

Abstract

Water column data of carbon and carbon-relevant hydrographic and hydrochemical parameters from 188 cruises in the Arctic Mediterranean Seas, Atlantic and Southern Ocean have been retrieved and merged in a new data base: The CARINA (CARbon IN the Atlantic) Project. These data have gone through rigorous quality control (QC) procedures so as to improve the quality and consistency of the data as much as possible. Secondary quality control, which involved objective study of data in order to quantify systematic differences in the reported values, was performed for the pertinent parameters in the CARINA data base. Systematic biases in the data have been tentatively corrected in the data products. The products are three merged data files with measured, adjusted and interpolated data of all cruises for each of the three CARINA regions (Arctic Mediterranean Seas, Atlantic and Southern Ocean). Ninety-eight cruises were conducted in the "Atlantic" defined as the region south of the Greenland-Iceland-Scotland Ridge and north of about 30° S. Here we report the details of the secondary QC which was done on the total dissolved inorganic carbon (TCO2) data and the adjustments that were applied to yield the final data product in the Atlantic. Procedures of quality control-including crossover analysis between stations and inversion analysis of all crossover data- A re briefly described. Adjustments were applied to TCO2 measurements for 17 of the cruises in the Atlantic Ocean region. With these adjustments, the CARINA data base is consistent both internally as well as with GLODAP data, an oceanographic data set based on the WOCE Hydrographic Program in the 1990s, and is now suitable for accurate assessments of, for example, regional oceanic carbon inventories, uptake rates and model validation.