Surface Freshwater Flux Estimation Using TRMM Measurements Over the Tropical Oceans

Satya Prakash, Mahesh C, Rakesh Mohan Gairola, Samir Pokhrel

.

DOI: 10.4236/acs.2011.14025                

Abstract

The exchange of surface freshwater, heat and moisture fluxes across the air-sea interface strongly influences the oceanic circulation and its variability at all time scales. The goal of this paper is to estimate and examine surface freshwater flux at monthly scale exclusively from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) measurements over the tropical oceans for the period of 1998 - 2010. The monthly mean fields of TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI) sea surface temperature (SST), wind speed (WS), and total precipitable water (W) are used to estimate the surface evaporation utilizing the bulk aerodynamics parameterization formula. The merged TRMM Multisatellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA)-3B43 product is combined with the estimated evaporation to compute the surface freshwater flux. A preliminary comparison of the satellite derived evaporation, precipitation and freshwater flux has been carried out with the Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes (HOAPS-3) datasets. Also, the estimated evaporation and TMPA-3B43 precipitation are validated with in-situ observations from the moored buoys in the different oceans. The results suggest that the TRMM has great potential to estimate surface freshwater flux for climatological and oceanic hydrological applications.

Keywords

Evaporation, Precipitation, Freshwater Flux, Tropical Oceans, Oceanic Circulation

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

References

[1]	P. J. Webster, A. M. Moore, J. P. Loschnigg and R. R. Leben, “Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Dynamics in the In- dian Ocean during 1997-1998,” Nature, Vol. 401, 1999, pp. 356-360. doi:10.1038/43848
[2]	L. Yu and R. A. Weller, “Objectively Analyzed Air-Sea Heat Fluxes for the Global Ice-Free Oceans (1981- 2005),” Bulletin of American Meteorological Society, Vol. 88, 2007, pp. 527-539. doi:10.1175/BAMS-88-4-527
[3]	A. Bentamy, K. B. Katsaros, A. M. Mestas-Nunez, W. M. Drennan, E. B. Forde and H. Roquet, “Satellite Estimates of Wind Speed and Latent Heat Flux over the Global Oceans,” Journal of Climate, Vol. 16, 2003, pp. 637-656. doi:10.1175/1520-0442(2003)016<0637:SEOWSA>2.0.CO;2
[4]	P. Schlussel and A. Albert, “Latent Heat Flux at the Sea Surface Retrieved from Combined TMI and VIRS Meas- ure-ments of TRMM,” International Journal of Remote Sensing, Vol. 22, No. 10, 2001, pp. 1975-1998.
[5]	C. W. Fairall, E. F. Bradley, D. P. Rogers, J. B. Edson and G. S. Young, “Bulk Parameterization of Air-Sea Fluxes for Tropical Ocean-Global Atmosphere Coupled-Ocean Atmosphere Research Experi-ment,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 101, No. C2, 1996, pp. 3747-3764. doi:10.1029/95JC03205
[6]	R. M. Gairola, N. Gautam and P. C. Pandey, “Study of Latent Heat Flues and Associated Oceanic and Atmospheric Parameters over the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal Using Seasat-SMMR Data,” Indian Journal of Radio and Space Physics, Vol. 21, 1992, pp. 143-148.
[7]	B. Simon and P. S. Desai, “Equatorial Indian Ocean Evaporation Estimates from Operational Mete-orological Satellites and Some Inferences in the Context of Monsoon Onset and Activity,” Boundary-Layer Meteorology, Vol. 37, 1986, pp. 37-52. doi:10.1007/BF00122755
[8]	W. T. Liu, K. B. Katsaros and J. A. Businger, “Bulk Parameterization of Air-Sea Exchanges of Heat and Water Vapor Including the Molecular Constraints at the Interface,” Journal of Atmospheric Sciences, Vol. 36, 1979, pp. 1722-1735. doi:10.1175/1520-0469(1979)036<1722:BPOASE>2.0.CO;2
[9]	R. Singh, C. M. Kishtawal, P. K. Pal and P. C. Joshi, “Sur-face Heat Fluxes over Global Oceans Exclusively from Satel-lite Observations,” Monthly Weather Review, Vol. 134, 2006, pp. 965-980. doi:10.1175/MWR3119.1
[10]	R. Singh, P. C. Joshi and C. M. Kishtawal, “A New Tech- nique for Estimation of Surface Latent Heat Fluxes Using Satellite-Based Observa-tions,” Monthly Weather Review, Vol. 133, 2005, pp. 2692-2710. doi:10.1175/MWR2993.1
[11]	N. Gautam, S. Basu, R. M. Gairola and P. C. Pandey, “A Curiosity Regarding the Relation between Surface Level Humidity and Precipitable Water,” Boundary-Layer Meteorology, Vol. 60, 1992, pp. 179-184. doi:10.1007/BF00122067
[12]	N. Gautam, S. Basu, C. M. Kishtawal, R. M. Gairola and P. C. Pandey, “A Critical As-sessment of the Q-W Relation and a Parameterization Relation for Computing Latent Heat Fluxes over the Indian Ocean,” International Journal of Remote Sensing, Vol. 16, No. 18, 1995, pp. 3649-3664. doi:10.1080/01431169508954652
[13]	S. A. Hsu and B. W. Blanchard, “The Relationship be- tween Total Precipitable Water and Surface Level Humidity over the Sea Surface: A Further Evaluation,” Journal of Geophysical Re-search, Vol. 94, 1989, pp. 14539-14545. doi:10.1029/JC094iC10p14539
[14]	W. T. Liu, “Statistical Relation between Monthly Mean Precipitable Water and Sur-face Level Humidity over Global Oceans,” Monthly Weather Review, Vol. 114, 1986, pp. 1591-1602. doi:10.1175/1520-0493(1986)114<1591:SRBMMP>2.0.CO;2
[15]	S. R. Smith, P. J. Hughes and M. A. Bourassa, “A Com- parison of Nine Monthly Air-Sea Flux Products,” International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 31, 2011, pp. 1002-1037. doi:10.1002/joc.2225
[16]	D. Bourras, “Comparison of Five Satellite-Derived Latent Heat Flux Products to Moored Buoy Data,” Journal of Climate, Vol. 19, 2006, pp. 6291-6313. doi:10.1175/JCLI3977.1
[17]	S. H. Chou, E. Nelkin, J. Ardiz-zone and R. M. Atlas, “A Comparison of Latent Heat Fluxes over Global Oceans for Four Flux Products,” Journal of Cli-mate, Vol. 17, 2004, pp. 3973-3989. doi:10.1175/1520-0442(2004)017<3973:ACOLHF>2.0.CO;2
[18]	J. Schulz, J. Meywerk, S. Ewald and P. Schlussel, “Evalua-tion of Satellite-Derived Latent Heat Fluxes,” Journal of Cli-mate, Vol. 10, 1997, pp. 2782-2795. doi:10.1175/1520-0442(1997)010<2782:EOSDLH>2.0.CO;2
[19]	S. Prakash, C. Mahesh, R. M. Gairola and P. K. Pal, “Es- timation of Indian Summer Monsoon Rainfall Using Kalpana-1 VHRR Data and Its Validation Using Rain Gauge and GPCP Data,” Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics, Vol. 110, 2010, pp. 45-57. doi:10.1007/s00703-010-0106-8
[20]	A. Mishra, R. M. Gairola, A. K. Varma and V. K. Agar- wal, “Remote Sensing of Pre-cipitation over Indian Land and Oceanic Regions by Synergis-tic Use of Multi-Satellite Sensors,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 115, 2010, D08106. doi:10.1029/2009JD012157
[21]	K. Aonashi, J. Awaka, M. Hirose, T. Kozu, T. Kubota, G. Liu, S. Shige, S. Kida, S. Seto, N. Takahashi and Y. N. Takayabu, “GSMaP Passive Micro-wave Precipitation Re- trieval Algorithm: Algorithm Descrip-tion and Validation,” Journal of Meteorological Society of Japan, Vol. 87A, 2009, pp. 119-136. doi:10.2151/jmsj.87A.119
[22]	C. K. Kidd, D. R. Kniveton, M. C. Todd and T. J. Bel- lerby, “Satellite Rainfall Estimation Using Combined Pas- sive Microwave and Infrared Algo-rithms,” Journal of Hydrometeorology, Vol. 4, 2003, pp. 1088-1104. doi:10.1175/1525-7541(2003)004<1088:SREUCP>2.0.CO;2
[23]	A. K. Mitra, A. K. Bohra, M. N. Rajeevan and T. N. Krishnamurti, “Daily Indian Precipitation Analysis Formed from a Merge of Rain-Gauge Data with the TRMM TMPA Sat-ellite-Derived Rainfall Estimates,” Journal of the Meteorological Society of Japan, Vol. 87A, 2009, pp. 265-279. doi:10.2151/jmsj.87A.265
[24]	G. J. Huffman, R. F. Adler, D. T. Bolvin, G. Gu, E. J. Nelkin, K. P. Bowman, Y. Hong, E. F. Stocker and D. B. Wolff, “The TRMM Multi-Satellite Precipi-tation Analysis: Quasi-Global, Multiyear, Combined Sensor Precipitation Estimation at Finer Scales,” Journal of Hydrome-teorology, Vol. 8, 2007, pp. 38-55. doi:10.1175/JHM560.1
[25]	R. F. Adler, G. J. Huffman, A. Chang, R. Ferraro, P. Xie, J. Janowiak, B. Rudolf, U. Schneider, S. Curtis, D. Bolvin, A. Gruber, J. Susskind and P. Arkin, “The Ver- sion-2 Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) Monthly Precipitation Analysis (1979-Present),” Journal of Hydrometeorology, Vol. 4, 2003, pp. 1147-1167. doi:10.1175/1525-7541(2003)004<1147:TVGPCP>2.0.CO;2
[26]	C. A. Schlosser and P. R. Houser, “Assessing a Satel-lite-Era Perspective of the Global Water Cycle,” Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, 2007, pp. 1316-1338. doi:10.1175/JCLI4057.1
[27]	A. Andersson, C. Klepp, K. Fennig, S. Bakan, H. Grassl and J. Schulz, “Evaluation of HOAPS-3 Ocean Surface Freshwater Flux Components,” Journal of Applied Mete- orology and Climatology, Vol. 50, 2011, pp. 379-398. doi:10.1175/2010JAMC2341.1
[28]	A. Andersson, K. Fennig, C. Klepp, S. Bakan, H. Grassl and J. Schulz, “The Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data-HOAPS-3,” Earth System Sciences Data and Discussions, Vol. 3, 2010, pp. 143-194. doi:10.5194/essdd-3-143-2010
[29]	C. L. Gentemann, F. J. Wentz, C. A. Mears and D. K. Smith, “In situ Validation of Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission Microwave Sea Surface Temperatures,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 109, 2004, C04021. doi:10.1029/2003JC002092
[30]	F. J. Wentz, C. L. Gentemann, D. K. Smith and D. B. Chelton, “Satellite Measurements of Sea-Surface Temperature through Clouds,” Science, Vol. 288, 2000, pp. 847-850. doi:10.1126/science.288.5467.847
[31]	F. J. Wentz, “A Well Calibrated Ocean Algorithm for Special Sen-sor Microwave/Imager,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 102, No. C4, 1997, pp. 8703- 8718. doi:10.1029/96JC01751
[32]	M. J. McPhaden, A. J. Busalac-chi, R. Cheney, J. R. Donguy, K. S. Gage, D. Halpern, M. Ji, P. Julian, G. Meyers, G. T. Mitchum, P. P. Niiler, J. Picaut, R. W. Reynolds, N. Smith and K. Takeuchi, ‘The Tropical Ocean-Global Atmosphere (TOGA) Observing System: A Decade of Progress,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 103, 1998, pp. 14169-14240. doi:10.1029/97JC02906
[33]	B. Bourles, R. Lumpkin, M. J. McPhaden, F. Hernandez, P. Nobre, E. Campos, L. Yu, S. Planton, A. Busalacchi, A. D. Moura, J. Servain and J. Trotte, “The PIRATA Program: History, Accomplishments and Future Directions,” Bulletin of American Meteorological Society, Vol. 89, 1998, pp. 1111-1125. doi:10.1175/2008BAMS2462.1
[34]	M. J. McPhaden, G. Meyers, K. Ando, Y. Masumoto, V. S. N. Murty, M. Ravi-chandran, F. Syamsudin, J. Vialard, L. Yu and W. Yu, ‘RAMA The Research Moored Array for African-Asian-Australian Monsoon Analysis and Prediction,” Bulletin of American Me-teorological Society, Vol. 90, 2009, pp. 459-480. doi:10.1175/2008BAMS2608.1
[35]	R. M. Gairola, S. Pokhrel, A. K. Varma, A. Sarkar and V. K. Agarwal, “Evaporation and Precipitation Estimates from TRMM Microwave Measure-ments,” International Conference on Monsoon, Bangalore, 2007.
[36]	T. A. Fan and B. Lin, “Latent Heat Flux at the Sea Surface Estimated from the TRMM Satellite,” American Geo-physical Union, Fall Meeting, Abstract #OS21C-1246, 2004.
[37]	D. Halpern and C. W. Hung, “Satellite Observations of the Southeast Pacific Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone dur-ing 1993-1998,” Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 106, No. D22, 2001, pp. 28107-28112. doi:10.1029/2000JD000056