Simulated Signatures of Greenland Melting in the North Atlantic: A Model Comparison With Argo Floats, Satellite Observations, and Ocean Reanalysis

Increased Greenland ice sheet melting has an impact on global mean and regional sea level rise and the ocean circulation. In this study, we explore whether Greenland melting signatures found in ocean model simulations are visible in observations from radar altimetry, satellite gravimetry and Argo floats. We have included Greenland freshwater flux (GF) in the global Finite-Element-Sea ice-Ocean Model (FESOM) for the years 1993-2016. The reference run is computed by excluding Greenland freshwater input. These experiments are performed on a low resolution (ca. 24 km) and a high resolution (ca. 6 km) eddy-permitting mesh. For comparison with the model experiments, we use different observational data, such as Argo floats, satellite observations, and reanalyses. We find that surface GF maps into signatures in temperature and salinity down to about 100 m in the surroundings of Greenland. The simulated melting signatures are particularly visible in steric heights in Baffin Bay and Davis Strait. Here, we find an improvement of the mean square error of up to 30% when including GF. For the Nordic part of the Nordic Seas, however, we find no improvement when including GF. We compare steric heights with reanalysis data and a new setup of the inversion method from gravimetric and altimetric satellite data. We cannot confirm that the GF signatures on variables such as temperature and salinity are visible in the observations on the time scales considered. However, we find that increased model resolution often causes larger improvements than occur due to including the simulated melting effect.

Automated summary

This study explores the visibility of Greenland melting signatures in observations. It finds that Greenland freshwater flux affects temperature and salinity, especially in the vicinity of Greenland, and the melting signatures are particularly visible in steric heights in Baffin Bay and Davis Strait.