Perturbation and Recovery of Sea Surface pCO2 During Extreme Events.

Tuesday, 24 January 2017
Ballroom II (San Juan Marriott)
Joseph Salisbury, University of New Hampshire, Ocean Processes Analysis Laboratory, Durham, NH, United States, Severine Fournier, JPL/NASA/Caltech, Pasadena, CA, United States, Bror Jonsson, University of New Hampshire, Ocean Processes Analysis Lab, Durham, NH, United States and Melissa Melendez, University of New Hampshire, Earth Sciences, Durham, NH, United States
Abstract:
The status of pCO2 in the surface ocean is perturbed during storm activity as deepening of the mixed layer entrains waters rich in dissolved inorganic carbon or interacts with the benthic boundary. Other climate events such as extreme seasonal precipitation, net heating or incursions of exotic water masses will also cause changes in surface pCO2, typically over sub-seasonal timescales. After a perturbation, a system may recover to its initial state over time scales lasting days to weeks. However, in some cases recovery may take several months, exacerbating or alleviating carbonate system stresses on calcifying ecosystems. The recovery trajectory may follow several paths, depending on the intensity and duration of the event, net subsidies of heat, freshwater and nutrients, depth of the mixed layer and seasonal timing.

We discuss these phenomena and show examples of surface perturbation and recovery scenarios arising from hurricanes and anomalous water mass flow in the Tropical Atlantic, anomalous heating in the Northwest Atlantic and intense storms and seasonal precipitation extremes at CO2 buoys in the Gulf of Maine and at the Enrique reef in La Parguera, PR.

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