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The role of stratification on lakes' thermal response: The case of L ake S uperior
Author(s) -
Piccolroaz Sebastiano,
Toffolon Marco,
Majone Bruno
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1002/2014wr016555
Subject(s) - thermal stratification , stratification (seeds) , environmental science , thermal , climate change , climatology , global warming , air temperature , meteorology , atmospheric sciences , hydrology (agriculture) , geology , oceanography , geography , biology , seed dormancy , thermocline , botany , germination , dormancy , geotechnical engineering
During the last several decades, the Great Lakes region has been experiencing a significant rise in temperatures, with the extraordinary summer warming that affected Lake Superior in 1998 as an example of the marked response of the lake to increasingly warmer atmospheric conditions. In this work, we combine the analysis of this exceptional event with some synthetic scenarios, to achieve a deeper understanding of the main processes driving the thermal dynamics of surface water temperature in Lake Superior. The analysis is performed by means of the lumped model air2water , which simulates lake surface temperature as a function of air temperature alone. The model provides information about the seasonal stratification dynamics, suggesting that unusual warming events can result from two factors: anomalously high summer air temperatures, and increased strength of stratification resulting from a warm spring. The relative contribution of the two factors is quantified using the model by means of synthetic scenarios, which provide a simple but effective description of the positive feedback between the thermal behavior and the stratification dynamics of the lake.