RAPID - Round 1 - The role of salinity in ocean circulation and climate response to greenhouse gas forcing Project

Introduction

Salinity is a major contributor to ocean circulation, stability and variability. Its structure depends on the surface freshwater flux whose distribution is likely to change significantly under global warming, giving rise to the potential for abrupt changes in climate. This project will investigate the mechanisms and feedback loops which govern the salinity distribution in coupled ocean-atmosphere models. Carefully designed experiments where feedbacks are removed will provide a major contribution to understand the role of salinity in the climate response to greenhouse gas forcing. Innovative diagnostics will be developed to assess the salinity/fresh water cycle performance of climate forecast models.

Project Duration: 1 Oct 2003 - 30 Sep 2006

This project is funded by NERC - Grant Ref. NER/T/S/2002/00442 - through the RAPID Climate Change NERC directed mode programme.

Availability of data

This project will mainly use the HadCM3 1000 year run, which is archived at BADC through COAPEC. Other UK community models such as HadGEM and HiGEM may also be used but their availability in time for this project is not yet certain. The PI also has access to models from allied research projects such as PRISM and CAPRI.

Access to data and information

Data and software supplied from this project to the BADC will be stored in the BADC RAPID archive.

Access to the archive is currently restricted to participants to this particular project. If you are a programme participant and would like to access this RAPID project data, then please apply for access^* to the RAPID data.

You will be requested to abide by the RAPID Climate Change Data Policy.
Data management, availability and use are ruled by the RAPID Climate Change Programme Data Management Plan (PDF document).
Access to Hadley Centre model data held at the BADC is subject to the signature of the NERC-Met Office agreement.

^* Note that to apply for access to this dataset, you should first register as a BADC user (anyone is allowed to register). If you are already a registered BADC user, skip this step. If you have forgotten your BADC user ID and/or password, please contact the BADC helpdesk at badc@rl.ac.uk. To register as a new BADC user, please follow the instructions online.

Citation

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Who to contact

This RAPID project is led by Dr E Guilyardi of the University of Reading, with co-investigators at the University of Reading also.

General queries about these pages or browsing the data should be directed to the BADC support line.

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