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Drivers of Future Extratropical Sea Surface Temperature Variability Changes in the North Pacific
  • Jacob L Gunnarson,
  • Malte Fabian Stuecker,
  • Sen Zhao
Jacob L Gunnarson
University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Malte Fabian Stuecker
University of Hawaii at Manoa
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Sen Zhao
University of Hawaii at Manoa
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Abstract

Under anthropogenic warming, future changes to climate variability beyond specific modes such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) have not been well-characterized. In the Community Earth System Model version 2 Large Ensemble (CESM2-LE) climate model, the future change to sea surface temperature (SST) variability is spatially heterogeneous. We examined these projected changes (between 1960-2000 and 2060-2100) in the North Pacific using a local linear stochastic-deterministic model, which allowed us to quantify the effect of changes to three drivers on SST variability: ocean “memory” (the SST damping timescale), ENSO teleconnections, and stochastic noise forcing. The ocean memory declines in most areas, but lengthens in the central North Pacific. This change is primarily due to changes in air-sea feedbacks and ocean damping, with the shallowing mixed layer depth playing a secondary role. An eastward shift of the ENSO teleconnection pattern is primarily responsible for the pattern of SST variance change.
27 Dec 2023Submitted to ESS Open Archive
28 Dec 2023Published in ESS Open Archive