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HOW THE PROJECT WORKS:OCEAN ANALYSIS
SYSTEM
Regional climatology
CSIRO has developed and maintains an Atlas of Regional Seas—a
regional (10N-60S: 90E-180E) high resolution, three-dimensional
ocean climatology of temperature and salinity fields.
Under the initiative, the present Atlas will be enhanced
with additional temperature and salinity information for the
Indonesian and New Zealand regions, as well as further historical
data from alternative sources, once quality controlled. The
resulting enhanced climatology will constitute the first-guess
field to be used by the analysis and forecast systems.
Regional analyses
An initial step in ocean forecasting will be development
of a daily, updated 'nowcast'—a comparison between what
the computer models predicts will happen today, and what is
really happening. This process assists scientists to refine
their models.
Near-real-time altimeter data (Jason-1 and Envisat)
and coastal tide-gauge sea level estimates will be used to
map sea-surface topography. These maps will be used, in conjunction
with a statistical projection method, the Regional Atlas,
and available in situ data (e.g. Argo profiling floats,
XBTs, research and navy vessels) to infer three-dimensional
estimates of the ocean’s temperature and salinity structure.
A real-time sea surface temperature (SST) analysis will be
developed, with around 5-10 km spatial resolution in the Australian
region. The analysis will take advantage of geostationary
satellite data to get some resolution of the diurnal cycle
and microwave SST data to eliminate gaps arising from cloud
cover.
Surface currents will be estimated from sequential images
of remotely sensed sea surface temperatures (SST), using a
method that tracks the movements of small-scale features.
A high-quality, validated, enhanced regional resolution wind
vector product will be developed. The product will be built
from global and regional Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP)
products blended with data and will include surface wave effects.
These products will used to force the forecast models.
Operational ocean analysis system
Once developed, the various components of the regional analysis
system will be integrated by the Bureau of Meteorology under
a common framework for routine monitoring of performance to
provide operational analyses of subsurface thermal structure,
surface currents, wind stress, SST and surface topography.
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