skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Evolution of Ocean Heat Content Related to ENSO

Journal Article · · Journal of Climate
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5]
  1. International Center for Climate and Environment Sciences, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
  2. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado
  3. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, Reading, United Kingdom, and Department of Meteorology and Geophysics, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
  4. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, Reading, United Kingdom
  5. International Center for Climate and Environment Sciences, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
+ Show Author Affiliations

As the strongest interannual perturbation to the climate system, El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) dominates the year-to-year variability of the ocean energy budget. Here we combine ocean observations, reanalyses, and surface flux data with Earth system model simulations to obtain estimates of the different terms affecting the redistribution of energy in the Earth system during ENSO events, including exchanges between ocean and atmosphere and among different ocean basins, and lateral and vertical rearrangements. This comprehensive inventory allows better understanding of the regional and global evolution of ocean heat related to ENSO and provides observational metrics to benchmark performance of climate models. Results confirm that there is a strong negative ocean heat content tendency (OHCT) in the tropical Pacific Ocean during El Niño, mainly through enhanced air–sea heat fluxes Q into the atmosphere driven by high sea surface temperatures. In addition to this diabatic component, there is an adiabatic redistribution of heat both laterally and vertically (0–100 and 100–300 m) in the tropical Pacific and Indian oceans that dominates the local OHCT. Heat is also transported and discharged from 20°S–5°N into off-equatorial regions within 5°–20°N during and after El Niño. OHCT and Q changes outside the tropical Pacific Ocean indicate the ENSO-driven atmospheric teleconnections and changes of ocean heat transport (i.e., Indonesian Throughflow). The tropical Atlantic and Indian Oceans warm during El Niño, partly offsetting the tropical Pacific cooling for the tropical oceans as a whole. While there are distinct regional OHCT changes, many compensate each other, resulting in a weak but robust net global ocean cooling during and after El Niño.

Research Organization:
University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC); National Key Research and Development Program of China; National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0012711; 2017YFA0603202; 2016YFC1401705; AGS-1243125
OSTI ID:
1515583
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1611937
Journal Information:
Journal of Climate, Journal Name: Journal of Climate Vol. 32 Journal Issue: 12; ISSN 0894-8755
Publisher:
American Meteorological SocietyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 36 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (97)

Vacillations in a Coupled Ocean–Atmosphere Model journal February 1988
Observed Interannual Variability in the Hadley Circulation and Its Connection to ENSO journal November 1996
Combining satellite observations and reanalysis energy transports to estimate global net surface energy fluxes 1985–2012 journal September 2015
Interannual Variability of Indian Ocean Heat Transport journal March 2006
The atmospheric energy budget and implications for surface fluxes and ocean heat transports journal February 2001
Relationships among top‐of‐atmosphere radiation and atmospheric state variables in observations and CESM journal October 2015
Slow Variability in the Equatorial West-Central Pacific in Relation to ENSO journal August 1997
Seasonal aspects of the recent pause in surface warming journal August 2014
Evaluation of satellite and reanalysis-based global net surface energy flux and uncertainty estimates: Surface Energy Flux and Uncertainty journal June 2017
The Heat Sources and Sinks of the 1986–87 El Niño journal October 2000
Hurricane Harvey Links to Ocean Heat Content and Climate Change Adaptation journal May 2018
ENSO Asymmetry in CMIP5 Models journal June 2014
The Response of Tropical Atmospheric Energy Budgets to ENSO journal July 2013
Wind Stress Curl and ENSO Discharge/Recharge in the Equatorial Pacific journal April 2007
Evolution of El Niño–Southern Oscillation and global atmospheric surface temperatures journal January 2002
The Atmospheric Bridge: The Influence of ENSO Teleconnections on Air–Sea Interaction over the Global Oceans journal August 2002
The global ocean imprint of ENSO: THE GLOBAL OCEAN IMPRINT OF ENSO journal July 2011
Toward Optimal Closure of the Earth's Top-of-Atmosphere Radiation Budget journal February 2009
El Niño Modoki and its possible teleconnection journal January 2007
Insights into Earth’s Energy Imbalance from Multiple Sources journal October 2016
A Theory for El Nino and the Southern Oscillation journal May 1985
Atlantic meridional heat transports computed from balancing Earth's energy locally journal February 2017
The partition of regional sea level variability journal September 2015
Pacific origin of the abrupt increase in Indian Ocean heat content during the warming hiatus journal May 2015
Direct estimates of the Indonesian Throughflow entering the Indian Ocean: 2004–2006 journal January 2009
Influence of El Niño on the Upper-Ocean Circulation in the Tropical Atlantic Ocean journal October 2007
Multidecadal Indian Ocean Variability Linked to the Pacific and Implications for Preconditioning Indian Ocean Dipole Events journal February 2017
Understanding ENSO Diversity journal June 2015
Precursors of the El Niño/La Niña onset and their interrelationship journal January 2010
Systematic Comparison of ENSO Teleconnection Patterns between Models and Observations journal January 2012
Predictability of Sea Surface Temperature and Sea Level Pressure Anomalies over the North Pacific Ocean journal May 1976
Coordinated heat removal from the equatorial Pacific during the 1986-87 El Niño journal July 1998
Coupled ocean–atmosphere dynamics in the Indian Ocean during 1997–98 journal September 1999
Tropical Atlantic sea surface temperature variability and its relation to El Niño-Southern Oscillation journal January 1997
Toward Consistent Diagnostics of the Coupled Atmosphere and Ocean Energy Budgets journal November 2017
Upper equatorial Pacific Ocean current and salinity variability during the 1996-1998 El Niño-La Niña cycle journal January 2000
Equatorial waves and the 1997-98 El Niño journal October 1999
ENSO as an Integrating Concept in Earth Science journal December 2006
Signal Versus Noise in the Southern Oscillation journal February 1984
The rate of sea-level rise journal March 2014
An Observational Estimate of Inferred Ocean Energy Divergence journal May 2008
A Model El Niñ–Southern Oscillation journal October 1987
El Niño, La Niña, and the global sea level budget journal January 2016
Water displacements in the Pacific and the genesis of El Nino cycles journal January 1985
Progress during TOGA in understanding and modeling global teleconnections associated with tropical sea surface temperatures journal June 1998
Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) Energy Balanced and Filled (EBAF) Top-of-Atmosphere (TOA) Edition-4.0 Data Product journal January 2018
Reexamination of the Observed Decadal Variability of the Earth Radiation Budget Using Altitude-Corrected ERBE/ERBS Nonscanner WFOV Data journal August 2006
Observations of Warm Water Volume Changes in the Equatorial Pacific and Their Relationship to El Niño and La Niña journal October 2000
The Version-2 Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) Monthly Precipitation Analysis (1979–Present) journal December 2003
Ocean heat content variability and change in an ensemble of ocean reanalyses journal September 2015
Distinctive ocean interior changes during the recent warming slowdown journal September 2015
Changes in precipitation with climate change journal March 2011
Regional Energy and Water Cycles: Transports from Ocean to Land journal October 2013
ENSO-related impacts on Antarctic sea ice: a synthesis of phenomenon and mechanisms journal November 2004
Interannual Variability in Global Mean Sea Level Estimated from the CESM Large and Last Millennium Ensembles journal October 2016
El Niño–Southern Oscillation complexity journal July 2018
A review of global ocean temperature observations: Implications for ocean heat content estimates and climate change: REVIEW OF OCEAN OBSERVATIONS journal September 2013
Mechanisms for the Indian Ocean warming during the 1997-98 El Niño journal March 1999
ENSO-Related Global Ocean Heat Content Variations journal December 2018
Improved estimates of ocean heat content from 1960 to 2015 journal March 2017
The Indonesian seas and their role in the coupled ocean–climate system journal June 2014
The equatorial Atlantic oscillation and its response to ENSO journal February 2000
On the Energy Exchange between Tropical Ocean Basins Related to ENSO journal September 2014
OCEAN5: The ECMWF Ocean Reanalysis System and its Real-Time analysis component text January 2018
A 21st century shift in the relationship between ENSO SST and warm water volume anomalies: ENSO SST AND WARM WATER VOLUME journal May 2012
Playing hide and seek with El Niño journal August 2015
ENSO-driven energy budget perturbations in observations and CMIP models journal March 2016
Atmospheric bridge, oceanic tunnel, and global climatic teleconnections journal January 2007
The influence of ENSO on air-sea interaction in the Atlantic: THE INFLUENCE OF ENSO ON AIR-SEA INTERACTION IN THE ATLANTIC journal July 2002
ENSO's Changing Influence on Temperature, Precipitation, and Wildfire in a Warming Climate journal September 2018
The Community Earth System Model (CESM) Large Ensemble Project: A Community Resource for Studying Climate Change in the Presence of Internal Climate Variability journal August 2015
On the 30–60 Day Oscillation and the Prediction of El Niño journal November 1989
Earth’s Energy Imbalance journal May 2014
El Niño—The Dynamic Response of the Equatorial Pacific Oceanto Atmospheric Forcing journal October 1975
Role of Air–Sea Interaction in the Long Persistence of El Niño–Induced North Indian Ocean Warming* journal April 2009
ENSO Atmospheric Teleconnections and Their Response to Greenhouse Gas Forcing journal February 2018
Indo-western Pacific ocean capacitor and coherent climate anomalies in post-ENSO summer: A review journal February 2016
An Equatorial Ocean Recharge Paradigm for ENSO. Part I: Conceptual Model journal April 1997
Sensitivity of Global Upper-Ocean Heat Content Estimates to Mapping Methods, XBT Bias Corrections, and Baseline Climatologies journal July 2016
Long equatorial wave reflection in the Pacific Ocean from TOPEX/POSEIDON data during the 1992-1998 period journal March 1999
El Niño: A coupled response to radiative heating? journal August 1997
Unabated planetary warming and its ocean structure since 2006 journal February 2015
An imperative to monitor Earth's energy imbalance journal January 2016
Benefits of CMIP5 Multimodel Ensemble in Reconstructing Historical Ocean Subsurface Temperature Variations journal August 2016
Global analyses of sea surface temperature, sea ice, and night marine air temperature since the late nineteenth century journal January 2003
Interannual Variability of Patterns of Atmospheric Mass Distribution journal August 2005
Fifteen years of ocean observations with the global Argo array journal January 2016
Weak ENSO asymmetry due to weak nonlinear air–sea interaction in CMIP5 climate models journal March 2016
Distinctive climate signals in reanalysis of global ocean heat content: SIGNALS IN OCEAN HEAT CONTENT journal May 2013
Changes in global net radiative imbalance 1985-2012 journal August 2014
Remote Sea Surface Temperature Variations during ENSO: Evidence for a Tropical Atmospheric Bridge journal April 1999
As El Niño builds, Pacific Warm Pool expands, ocean gains more heat: ENSO, the Ocean, and Earth's Energy Uptake journal January 2017
Contrasting Eastern-Pacific and Central-Pacific Types of ENSO journal February 2009
Is the detection of accelerated sea level rise imminent? journal August 2016
Interannual variability of the I ndonesian T hroughflow transport: A revisit based on 30 year expendable bathythermograph data journal December 2015
The Definition of El Niño journal December 1997
Applications of an Updated Atmospheric Energetics Formulation journal August 2018

Similar Records

Impacts of ENSO events on cloud radiative effects in preindustrial conditions: Changes in cloud fraction and their dependence on interactive aerosol emissions and concentrations
Journal Article · Thu May 19 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres · OSTI ID:1515583
+12 more
ENSO-driven energy budget perturbations in observations and CMIP models
Journal Article · Sat Mar 19 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Climate Dynamics · OSTI ID:1515583
+1 more
ENSO's Changing Influence on Temperature, Precipitation, and Wildfire in a Warming Climate
Journal Article · Wed Aug 22 00:00:00 EDT 2018 · Geophysical Research Letters · OSTI ID:1515583

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
meteorology & atmospheric sciences
ocean
energy transport
ENSO
ocean dynamics