Impact of the Arctic Observing Systems on the ECCC Global Weather Forecasts

Effective ocean management requires integrated and sustainable ocean observing systems enabling us to map and understand ecosystem properties and the effects of human activities. Autonomous subsurface and surface vehicles, here collectively referred to as “gliders”, are part of such ocean observing systems providing high spatiotemporal resolution. In this paper, we present some of the results achieved through the project “Unmanned ocean vehicles, a flexible and cost-efficient offshore monitoring and data management approach—GLIDER”. In this project, three autonomous surface and underwater vehicles were deployed along the Lofoten–Vesterålen (LoVe) shelf-slope-oceanic system, in Arctic Norway. The aim of this effort was to test whether gliders equipped with novel sensors could effectively perform ecosystem surveys by recording physical, biogeochemical, and biological data simultaneously. From March to September 2018, a period of high biological activity in the area, the gliders were able to record a set of environmental parameters, including temperature, salinity, and oxygen, map the spatiotemporal distribution of zooplankton, and record cetacean vocalizations and anthropogenic noise. A subset of these parameters was effectively employed in near-real-time data assimilative ocean circulation models, improving their local predictive skills. The results presented here demonstrate that autonomous gliders can be effective long-term, remote, noninvasive ecosystem monitoring and research platforms capable of operating in high-latitude marine ecosystems. Accordingly, these platforms can record high-quality baseline environmental data in areas where extractive activities are planned and provide much-needed information for operational and management purposes.

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Assessment of Temperature and Specific Humidity Inversions and Their Relationships in Three Global Reanalysis Products over the Arctic Ocean

Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology ◽

10.1175/jamc-d-20-0079.1 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 60 (4) ◽

pp. 493-511

Author(s):

Liang Chang ◽

Shiqiang Wen ◽

Guoping Gao ◽

Zhen Han ◽

Guiping Feng ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Arctic Ocean ◽

Specific Humidity ◽

The Arctic ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

The Arctic Ocean ◽

Temperature Inversions ◽

Global Reanalysis ◽

Less Common Multiple ◽

Better Than

AbstractCharacteristics of temperature inversions (TIs) and specific humidity inversions (SHIs) and their relationships in three of the latest global reanalyses—the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Interim Reanalysis (ERA-I), the Japanese 55-year Reanalysis (JRA-55), and the ERA5—are assessed against in situ radiosonde (RS) measurements from two expeditions over the Arctic Ocean. All reanalyses tend to detect many fewer TI and SHI occurrences, together with much less common multiple TIs and SHIs per profile than are seen in the RS data in summer 2008, winter 2015, and spring 2015. The reanalyses generally depict well the relationships among TI characteristics seen in RS data, except for the TIs below 400 m in summer, as well as above 1000 m in summer and winter. The depth is simulated worst by the reanalyses among the SHI characteristics, which may result from its sensitivity to the uncertainties in specific humidity in the reanalyses. The strongest TI per profile in RS data exhibits more robust dependency on surface conditions than the strongest SHI per profile, and the former is better presented by the reanalyses than the latter. Furthermore, all reanalyses have difficulties simulating the relationships between TIs and SHIs, together with the correlations between the simultaneous inversions. The accuracy and vertical resolution in the reanalyses are both important to properly capture occurrence and characteristics of the Arctic inversions. In general, ERA5 performs better than ERA-I and JRA-55 in depicting the relationships among the TIs. However, the representation of SHIs is more challenging than TIs in all reanalyses over the Arctic Ocean.

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The use of SMILES data to study ozone loss in the Arctic winter 2009/2010 and comparison with Odin/SMR data using assimilation techniques

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ◽

10.5194/acp-14-12855-2014 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 14 (23) ◽

pp. 12855-12869 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

K. Sagi ◽

D. Murtagh ◽

J. Urban ◽

H. Sagawa ◽

Y. Kasai

Keyword(s):

Ozone Depletion ◽

Transport Model ◽

Space Station ◽

Polar Vortex ◽

The Arctic ◽

Mixing Ratio ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

Ozone Loss ◽

Medium Range ◽

Assimilation Model

Abstract. The Superconducting Submillimeter-Wave Limb-Emission Sounder (SMILES) on board the International Space Station observed ozone in the stratosphere with high precision from October 2009 to April 2010. Although SMILES measurements only cover latitudes from 38° S to 65° N, the combination of data assimilation methods and an isentropic advection model allows us to quantify the ozone depletion in the 2009/2010 Arctic polar winter by making use of the instability of the polar vortex in the northern hemisphere. Ozone data from both SMILES and Odin/SMR (Sub-Millimetre Radiometer) for the winter were assimilated into the Dynamical Isentropic Assimilation Model for OdiN Data (DIAMOND). DIAMOND is an off-line wind-driven transport model on isentropic surfaces. Wind data from the operational analyses of the European Centre for Medium- Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) were used to drive the model. In this study, particular attention is paid to the cross isentropic transport of the tracer in order to accurately assess the ozone loss. The assimilated SMILES ozone fields agree well with the limitation of noise induced variability within the SMR fields despite the limited latitude coverage of the SMILES observations. Ozone depletion has been derived by comparing the ozone field acquired by sequential assimilation with a passively transported ozone field initialized on 1 December 2009. Significant ozone loss was found in different periods and altitudes from using both SMILES and SMR data: The initial depletion occurred at the end of January below 550 K with an accumulated loss of 0.6–1.0 ppmv (approximately 20%) by 1 April. The ensuing loss started from the end of February between 575 K and 650 K. Our estimation shows that 0.8–1.3 ppmv (20–25 %) of O3 has been removed at the 600 K isentropic level by 1 April in volume mixing ratio (VMR).

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Implementation of a multipurpose Arctic Ocean Observing System

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-20347 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Stein Sandven ◽

Hanne Sagen ◽

Agnieszka Beszczynska-Möller ◽

Peter Vo ◽

Marie-Noelle Houssais ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Arctic Ocean ◽

Water Column ◽

The Arctic ◽

Sea Floor ◽

Acoustic Thermometry ◽

The Arctic Ocean ◽

Global Coverage ◽

Cable Systems ◽

Ocean Observing ◽

Observing Systems

The central Arctic Ocean is one of the least observed oceans in the world. This ice-covered region is challenging for ocean observing with respect to technology, logistics and costs. Many physical, biogeochemical, biological, and geophysical processes in the water column and sea floor under the sea ice are difficult to observe and therefore poorly understood. Today, there are technological advances in platforms and sensors for under-ice observation, which offer possibilities to install and operate sustained observing infrastructures in the Arctic Ocean. The goal of the INTAROS project is to develop integrated observing systems in the Arctic, including improvement of data sharing and dissemination to various user groups. INTAROS supports a number of systems providing data from the ocean in delayed mode as well as in near-real time mode, but only a few operate in the ice-covered areas.Autonomous observing platforms used in the ice-free oceans such as Argo floats, gliders, and autonomous surface vehicles cannot yet be used operationally in ice-covered Arctic regions. The limitation is because the sea ice prevents these underwater platforms from reaching the surface for satellite communication and geopositioning. To improve the Arctic Ocean Observing capability OceanObs19 recommended &#8216;to pilot a sustained multipurpose acoustic network for positioning, tomography, passive acoustics, and communication in an integrated Arctic Observing System, with eventual transition to global coverage&#8217;. Acoustic networks have been used locally and regionally in the Arctic for underwater acoustic thermometry, geo-positioning for floats and gliders, and passive acoustic. The Coordinated Arctic Acoustic Thermometry Experiment (CAATEX) is a first step toward developing a basin-scale multipurpose acoustic network using modern instrumentation.To provide secure data delivery, submarine cables are needed either as dedicated cabled observatories or as hybrid cable systems (sharing the cable infrastructure between science and commercial telecommunications), or both combined. Several large-scale cabled observatories existing coastal areas in world oceans, but none on the Arctic Ocean. At OceanObs19 it was recommended to transition (telecom+sensing) SMART subsea cable systems from present pilots to trans-ocean implementation, to address climate, ocean circulation, sea level, tsunami and earthquake early warning, ultimately with global coverage. Cabled observatories, either stand alone or branching from a hybrid system, could provide power and real time communication to support connected water column moorings and sea floor instrumentation as well as docking mobile platforms. Subsea cable developers are looking into the possibility to deploy a communication cable across the Arctic Ocean from Europe to Asia, because this offers a much shorter route compared to the terrestrial cables.&#160;An international consortium of leading scientists in ocean observing with experience in state-of-the-art technologies on platforms, sensors, subsea cable technology, acoustic communication and data transmission plan to establish a project to implement and test the system based on experience from the CAATEX experiment and other Arctic observing system experiments. The INTAROS project is presently developing a Roadmap for an integrated Arctic Observing System, where multipurpose ocean observing systems will be one component.

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INTAROS synthesis of gap analysis of the existing Arctic observing systems

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-20091 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Roberta Pirazzini ◽

Michael Tjernström ◽

Stein Sandven ◽

Hanne Sagen ◽

Torill Hamre ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Arctic Ocean ◽

Gap Analysis ◽

Satellite Observations ◽

The Arctic ◽

Reference Level ◽

Data Handling ◽

Network Concept ◽

The Arctic Ocean ◽

Observing Systems

A comprehensive assessment of a substantial subset of Arctic observing systems, data collections and satellite products across scientific disciplines was carried out in INTAROS, also including data repositories and a brief scientific gap analysis. The assessments cover a multitude of aspects such as sustainability, technical maturity and data handling for the entire chain from observation to users, including metadata procedures and availability to data. Community based environment monitoring programs were surveyed and assessed separately; they do not form part of the present assessment.The assessed observing systems were first ranked according to general sustainability and other aspects, were analyzed subsequently. While the range of sustainability is large, it was found that high scores on all other aspects, such as for data handling and technical maturity, are more likely for systems with high sustainability. Moreover, many systems with high sustainability, as well as advanced systems for data handling and availability in place, resulted from national commitments to international monitoring or infrastructure programs, several of which are not necessarily particular to the Arctic.Traditionally, terrestrial and atmospheric observation network assessments build on the network concept with a &#8220;comprehensive&#8221; level including all observations, a &#8220;baseline&#8221; level of an agreed subset of sustained observations, and a &#8220;reference&#8221; level, with observations adhering to specific calibrations and traceability criteria. Examples from atmospheric observations are the &#8220;comprehensive&#8221; global GCOS radiosounding network, the &#8220;baseline&#8221; GUAN (GCOS Upper Air Network) and &#8220;reference&#8221; GRUAN (GCOS Reference Upper Air Network) networks. With the lack of in-situ observations especially from the Arctic Ocean and the logistical difficulties to deploy new stations, it was concluded that this concept does not work well in the Arctic.In summary, we recommend that:<ul><li>advancement in Arctic observing should be done in international global or regional programs with well-established routines and procedures, rather than to invest in new Arctic-specific programs</li> <li>investments in new instruments and techniques be done at already established sites, to benefit interdisciplinary studies and optimize infrastructure costs</li> <li>more observations be based on ships of opportunity and that a subset of ocean, sea-ice and atmosphere observations always be made on all research expeditions, regardless of their scientific aim</li> <li>the funding structures for science expeditions is reviewed to maintain, and preferably increase, the number of expeditions and to safeguard funding for appropriate data handling and storage</li> <li>observing-network concept for the atmosphere over the Arctic Ocean is revised, so that coupled reanalyses represent the &#8220;comprehensive level&#8221;, satellite observations complemented with available in-situ data is the &#8220;baseline level&#8221;, while scientific expeditions is the &#8220;reference level&#8221;. This requires substantial improvements in reanalysis, better numerical models and data assimilation, better satellite observations and improved data handling and accessibility for scientific expeditions.</li> </ul>

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Horizontal moisture transport shapes the regional moistening patterns in the Arctic

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-4428 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Tiina Nygård ◽

Tuomas Naakka ◽

Timo Vihma

Keyword(s):

Sea Ice ◽

Moisture Transport ◽

Flow Direction ◽

The Arctic ◽

Minor Role ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

Regional Trends ◽

Sea Ice Decline ◽

A Minor ◽

Increasing Trends

The Arctic has experienced regionally and seasonally variable moistening of the atmosphere during the recent decades. Compared to the accompanying amplified warming and dramatic sea ice decline, the moistening has so far remained less studied.We address the regional and seasonal trends in the horizontal moisture transport in the Arctic during the last four decades, in 1979&#8211;2018, based on data of ERA5 reanalysis of European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. We show that regional trends in moisture transport are large and mainly driven by changes in atmospheric circulation. We demonstrate that the regional moistening patterns in the Arctic during the last four decades have dominantly been shaped by these strong trends in horizontal moisture transport. Changes in local evaporation in the Arctic have only had a minor role in shaping the moistening patterns. We show that increasing trends in evaporation have been restricted to the vicinity of sea-ice margin over a limited period during the local sea-ice decline, and this step-wise increase has been followed by negative trends in evaporation in open sea, due to suppressing effect of horizontal moisture transport.Both evaporation and the horizontal moisture transport have been affected by the diminishing sea-ice cover during the cold seasons from autumn to spring, and their trends have been dependent on the flow direction. We summarize the current understanding and the new results of flow-dependency of the trends in moisture transport and evaporation near the sea-ice margin, and the cloud response to those.For the first time, we provide a detailed picture of both the drastic regional changes in the moisture transport within the Arctic and changes in local evaporation, and demonstrate large impacts of these changes on the climate of the Arctic. We suggest that also in the future, moisture and cloud distributions in the Arctic are expected to respond to changes in atmospheric pressure patterns; circulation and moisture transport will also control where and when efficient surface evaporation can occur.

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Meteorology as Citizen Science

Open Science Talk ◽

10.7557/19.5621 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Eirik Samuelsen ◽

Per Pippin Aspaas

Keyword(s):

Citizen Science ◽

The Arctic ◽

Weather Data ◽

Large Network ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

Project Smart ◽

Weather Stations ◽

Meteorological Models ◽

Meteorological Institute ◽

Weather Service

Eirik Samuelsen, senior meteorologist at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute (Met) and UiT The Arctic University of Norway, discusses the importance of citizen science to current meteorology in Norway. Amateurs contribute to the improvement of weather forecasts in various ways, from anecdotic but valuable feedback on errors in the forecast to a large network of private weather stations providing precious data for the free-to-use weather service www.yr.no. Besides yr.no as such, which is maintained by the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), there is mention of Eiriks værblogg (Eirik's weather blog) on Facebook, the network of Netatmo Weather Stations, the open database of meteorological models and weather data thredds.met.no, and the project Smart Senja. First published online September 23, 2020.

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Trends in Arctic seasonal and extreme precipitation in recent decades

10.21203/rs.3.rs-385100/v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Lejiang Yu ◽

Shiyuan Zhong

Keyword(s):

Extreme Precipitation ◽

The Arctic ◽

Positive Trend ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

Ice Melt ◽

Circulation Patterns ◽

Water Vapor Feedback ◽

Daily Precipitation Data ◽

Autumn And Winter ◽

Thermodynamic Processes

Abstract Daily precipitation data from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ERA-Interim) from 1979 to 2016 are analyzed to determine the trends in seasonal and extreme precipitation across the pan-Arctic and estimate the contributions to the trends from the dynamic (e.g. changes in circulation patterns) and thermodynamic processes (e.g., sea ice melt – water vapor feedback) and their interactions. The trends in the seasonal total precipitation are generally consistent with the trends in the occurrence of seasonal extreme precipitation. Although the trends vary considerably in direction and magnitude across the pan-Arctic and the seasons, more regions experience a statistically significant positive trend than negative trend, particularly in autumn and winter seasons and over areas of the Arctic Ocean and the northern North Atlantic. Statistically significant negative trends are mostly found in areas of northern Eurasian and North America. The thermodynamic processes account for more than 85% of the total trends, with the rest of the trends explained by the dynamic processes (e.g., changes in circulation patterns) and the interaction between dynamic and thermodynamic processes.

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Examination of Optical Processes in The Atmosphere During Upper Air Soundings

Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology ◽

10.1175/jtech-d-20-0158.1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

A.V Kochin ◽

F.A Zagumennov ◽

V.L Fomenko

Keyword(s):

Optical Sensors ◽

Weather Forecasting ◽

The Arctic ◽

Visible Range ◽

Air Masses ◽

Cloud Data ◽

Weather Forecasts ◽

Climate Research ◽

Research Findings ◽

Using Data

AbstractImproving the quality of weather forecasts and the reliability of climate research requires increasing the reliability of measurements. This paper presents results for optical sensors attached to radiosondes. These sensors can measure cloud-top height (CTH) with high accuracy, determine the presence of precipitation particles in clouds and the height of the boundary between the tropospheric and stratospheric air masses. These research findings are especially important in the Arctic, where the reliability of cloud data is poor, especially during polar nights. With the help of a visible range optical sensor, during the daytime, it is possible to measure CTH with an accuracy of 50 meters. Using data from an IR sensor it is possible to measure CTH both day and night. The paper also discusses the possibility of using optical sensors in an observational network. The results from this study could be useful for both weather forecasting and climate research.

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