A novel approach to quantify metrics of upwelling intensity, frequency, and duration
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Date
2021
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Public Library of Science
Abstract
The importance of coastal upwelling systems is widely recognized. However, several
aspects of the current and future behaviors of these systems remain uncertain. Fluctuations
in temperature because of anthropogenic climate change are hypothesized to affect upwelling-favorable winds and coastal upwelling is expected to intensify across all Eastern Boundary Upwelling Systems. To better understand how upwelling may change in the future, it is
necessary to develop a more rigorous method of quantifying this phenomenon. In this
paper, we use SST data and wind data in a novel method of detecting upwelling signals and
quantifying metrics of upwelling intensity, duration, and frequency at four sites within the
Benguela Upwelling System. We found that indicators of upwelling are uniformly detected
across five SST products for each of the four sites and that the duration of those signals is
longer in SST products with higher spatial resolutions. Moreover, the high-resolution SST
products are significantly more likely to display upwelling signals at 25 km away from the
coast when signals were also detected at the coast.
Description
Keywords
Coastal upwelling systems, Climate change, Benguela upwelling system, SST products
Citation
Abrahams, A. et al. (2021). A novel approach to quantify metrics of upwelling intensity, frequency, and duration. PLoS ONE, 16(7), e0254026 . https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0254026