Seasonal and spatial variations of air-sea heat exchange in the seas around the Korean Peninsula: Based on the observations and reanalysis products from 2011 to 2016

Interannual Variability of Winter Sea Levels Induced by Local Wind Stress in the Northeast Asian Marginal Seas: 1993–2017

“…Although the wind-induced Ekman transports within the semi-enclosed deep and shallow basins in the NEAMS play a key role in the interannual variability of winter mean sea level, another mechanism for this variability can be considered. A cooling process due to the 18% increase in sea surface wind speed (5.37 m s −1 compared to 4.57 m s −1 ) via increased heat loss from the NEAMS into the atmosphere may lower the thermosteric sea level during Period L compared to Period H. Using the winter mean turbulent (sensible plus latent) heat flux of~300 W m −2 reported for the region [46], 13% higher and 5% lower cooling effects are estimated due to sea surface wind speeds (5.37 m s −1 compared to 4.82 m s −1 and 4.57 m s −1 compared to 4.82 m s −1 , respectively), which are stronger during Period L and weaker during Period H compared to the mean for the total period. The resultant turbulent heat fluxes are 285 W m −2 (= 300-(300 × 0.05)) during Period H and 339 W m −2 (= 300 + (300 × 0.13)) during Period L. However, sea surface cooling corresponding to the stronger wind speed lowers the steric sea level by only O (10 −3 m), which can be estimated based on the thermal expansion coefficient of 1.48 × 10 −4 • C −1 and density of 1025 kg m −3 corresponding to climatological mean temperature and salinity at the upper 250 m averaged over the NEAMS from 1995 to 2017 using Equation (4) below:…”