Climatological Studies on Air-Sea Interaction over the Northwestern Pacific

Abstract

Sensible and latent heat fluxes from ocean to atmosphere are estimated over the Northwestern Pacific by the use of data of the weather reports from commercial ships. As a result of analysis by the bulk method, a large amount of upward energy fluxes are seen in the winter over the Kuroshio region, and the downward sensible heat flux in the summer almost over the whole region, in spite of upward latent heat flux, is found. Annual variations of turbulent heat fluxes are also analyzed in several different sections of the Northwestern Pacific. A large range of variations as well as a large amount of energy fluxes are seen near the coast of the Continent and Japan Islands. The thermal energy balance analysis over the ocean shows that the sea surface receives more energy from radiation than the outgoing energy by turbulent sensible and latent heat transport into the atmosphere in almost the whole region over the Northwestern Pacific except for the area near the coast where thermal energy balance is held.