Open AccessVentilation of the Arctic Ocean: Mean ages and inventories of anthropogenic CO 2 and CFC‐11
Author(s) -
Tanhua Toste,
Jones E. Peter,
Jeansson Emil,
Jutterström Sara,
Smethie William M.,
Wallace Douglas W. R.,
Anderson Leif G.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: oceans
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.67
H-Index - 298
eISSN - 2156-2202
pISSN - 0148-0227
DOI - 10.1029/2008jc004868
Subject(s) - arctic , environmental science , canada basin , ocean current , oceanography , tracer , the arctic , water column , water mass , structural basin , climatology , geology , paleontology , physics , nuclear physics
The Arctic Ocean constitutes a large body of water that is still relatively poorly surveyed because of logistical difficulties, although the importance of the Arctic Ocean for global circulation and climate is widely recognized. For instance, the concentration and inventory of anthropogenic CO 2 ( C ant ) in the Arctic Ocean are not properly known despite its relatively large volume of well‐ventilated waters. In this work, we have synthesized available transient tracer measurements (e.g., CFCs and SF 6 ) made during more than two decades by the authors. The tracer data are used to estimate the ventilation of the Arctic Ocean, to infer deep‐water pathways, and to estimate the Arctic Ocean inventory of C ant . For these calculations, we used the transit time distribution (TTD) concept that makes tracer measurements collected over several decades comparable with each other. The bottom water in the Arctic Ocean has CFC values close to the detection limit, with somewhat higher values in the Eurasian Basin. The ventilation time for the intermediate water column is shorter in the Eurasian Basin (∼200 years) than in the Canadian Basin (∼300 years). We calculate the Arctic Ocean C ant inventory range to be 2.5 to 3.3 Pg‐C, normalized to 2005, i.e., ∼2% of the global ocean C ant inventory despite being composed of only ∼1% of the global ocean volume. In a similar fashion, we use the TTD field to calculate the Arctic Ocean inventory of CFC‐11 to be 26.2 ± 2.6 × 10 6 moles for year 1994, which is ∼5% of the global ocean CFC‐11 inventory.