MERIDIONAL HEAT TRANSPORT IN THE OCEANS ESTIMATED FROM LATITUDINAL SECTION DATA

A. N. Demidov and S. A. Dobrolyubov

A meridional heat flux and its components are calculated on the basis of the data on zonal hydrological sections in the World Ocean carried out in the framework of the WOCE Program. The technique of oceanographic estimation of the meridional heat transfer took into account the geostrophic transfer and the Ekman and Sverdrup components. On the whole, the results obtained agree well with the data of earlier calculations. The technique proposed for calculating the heat transfer from the latitudinal section data revealed the similarity of balance and oceanographic estimates. In addition, an oceanographic approach made it possible to distinguish the principal components in the heat transfer at different latitudes.

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