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'''DEFINITION''' The sea level ocean monitoring indicator is derived from the DUACS delayed-time (DT-2021 version) altimeter gridded maps of sea level anomalies based on a stable number of altimeters (two) in the satellite constellation. These products are distributed by the Copernicus Climate Change Service and are also available in the CMEMS catalogue (SEALEVEL_GLO_PHY_CLIMATE_L4_MY_008_057). The regional sea level trends are derived from a linear fit of the altimeter sea level maps. The altimeter data have not been corrected for the effect of the Glacial Isostatic Adjustment nor the TOPEX-A instrumental drift during the period 1993-1998. '''CONTEXT''' Mean sea level evolution has a direct impact on coastal areas and is a crucial index of climate change since it reflects both the amount of heat added in the ocean and the mass loss due to land ice melt (e.g. IPCC, 2013; Dieng et al., 2017). Long-term and inter-annual variations of the sea level are observed at global and regional scales. They are strongly related to the internal variability observed at basin scale and these variations can strongly affect population living in coastal areas. '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' The altimeter mean sea level trends since 1993 exhibit large-scale variations with amplitudes reaching up to +8 mm/yr in regions such as the western tropical Pacific Ocean. In this area, trends are mainly of thermosteric origin (Legeais et al., 2016; Meyssignac et al., 2017) in response to increased easterly winds during the last two decades associated with the decreasing Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO)/Pacific Decadal Oscillation (e.g. McGregor et al. 2012; Merrifield et al. 2012; Palanisamy et al. 2014; Han et al. 2010; Rietbroek et al. 2016). Prandi et al. (2021) have estimated a regional altimeter sea level error budget from which they determine a regional error variance-covariance matrix and they provide uncertainties of the regional sea level trends. Only the contribution of the measurement system is considered (the contribution from the ocean natural variability is not considered). Over 1993-2019, the averaged local sea level trend uncertainty is around 0.83 mm/yr with local values ranging from 0.78 to 1.22 mm/yr. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00238
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'''DEFINITION''' Heat transport across lines are obtained by integrating the heat fluxes along some selected sections and from top to bottom of the ocean. The values are computed from models’ daily output. The mean value over a reference period (1993-2014) and over the last full year are provided for the ensemble product and the individual reanalysis, as well as the standard deviation for the ensemble product over the reference period (1993-2014). The values are given in PetaWatt (PW). '''CONTEXT''' The ocean transports heat and mass by vertical overturning and horizontal circulation, and is one of the fundamental dynamic components of the Earth’s energy budget (IPCC, 2013). There are spatial asymmetries in the energy budget resulting from the Earth’s orientation to the sun and the meridional variation in absorbed radiation which support a transfer of energy from the tropics towards the poles. However, there are spatial variations in the loss of heat by the ocean through sensible and latent heat fluxes, as well as differences in ocean basin geometry and current systems. These complexities support a pattern of oceanic heat transport that is not strictly from lower to high latitudes. Moreover, it is not stationary and we are only beginning to unravel its variability. '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' The mean transports estimated by the ensemble global reanalysis are comparable to estimates based on observations; the uncertainties on these integrated quantities are still large in all the available products. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00245
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'''DEFINITION'''Ocean acidification is quantified by decreases in pH, which is a measure of acidity: a decrease in pH value means an increase in acidity, that is, acidification. The observed decrease in ocean pH resulting from increasing concentrations of CO2 is an important indicator of global change. The estimate of global mean pH builds on a reconstruction methodology, • Obtain values for alkalinity based on the so called “locally interpolated alkalinity regression (LIAR)” method after Carter et al., 2016; 2018. • Build on surface ocean partial pressure of carbon dioxide (CMEMS product: MULTIOBS_GLO_BIO_CARBON_SURFACE_REP_015_008) obtained from an ensemble of Feed-Forward Neural Networks (Chau et al. 2021) which exploit sampling data gathered in the Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT) (https://www.socat.info/) • Derive a gridded field of ocean surface pH based on the van Heuven et al., (2011) CO2 system calculations using reconstructed pCO2 (MULTIOBS_GLO_BIO_CARBON_SURFACE_REP_015_008) and alkalinity. The global mean average of pH at yearly time steps is then calculated from the gridded ocean surface pH field. It is expressed in pH unit on total hydrogen ion scale. In the figure, the amplitude of the uncertainty(1σ) of yearly mean surface sea water pH varies at a range of [0.0021, 0.0024] pH unit (see Quality Information Document for more details). The variation on the trend estimation amounts to 0.0006 pH unit per year. The indicator is derived from in situ observations of CO2 fugacity (SOCAT data base, www.socat.info, Bakker et al., 2016). These observations are still sparse in space and time. Monitoring pH at higher space and time resolutions, as well as in coastal regions will require a denser network of observations and preferably direct pH measurements. A scientific publication is in preparation for this indicator. '''CONTEXT''' The decrease in surface ocean pH is a direct consequence of the uptake by the ocean of carbon dioxide. It is referred to as ocean acidification. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Workshop on Impacts of Ocean Acidification on Marine Biology and Ecosystems (2011) defined Ocean Acidification as “a reduction in the pH of the ocean over an extended period, typically decades or longer, which is caused primarily by uptake of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but can also be caused by other chemical additions or subtractions from the ocean”. The pH of contemporary surface ocean waters is already 0.1 lower than at pre-industrial times and an additional decrease by 0.33 pH units is projected over the 21st century in response to the high concentration pathway RCP8.5 (Bopp et al., 2013). Ocean acidification will put marine ecosystems at risk (e.g. Orr et al., 2005; Gehlen et al., 2011; Kroeker et al., 2013). The monitoring of surface ocean pH has become a focus of many international scientific initiatives (http://goa-on.org/) and contributes to SDG14 (https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg14). '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS ''' Since the year 1985, global ocean surface pH is decreasing at a rate of -0.00160.0006 per year. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00224
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'''DEFINITION:''' Estimates of Arctic liquid Freshwater Content (FWC in meters) are obtained from integrated differences of the measured salinity and a reference salinity (set to 34.8) from the surface to the bottom per unit area in the Arctic region with a water depth greater than 500m as function of salinity (S), the vertical cell thickness of the dataset (dz) and the salinity reference (Sref). Waters saltier than the 34.8 reference are not included in the estimation. The regional FWC values from 1993 up to real time are then averaged aiming to: # obtain the mean FWC as expressed in cubic km (km3) # monitor the large-scale variability and change of liquid freshwater stored in the Arctic Ocean (i.e. the change of FWC in time). '''CONTEXT:''' The Arctic region is warming twice as fast as the global mean and its climate is undergoing unprecedented and drastic changes, affecting all the components of the Arctic system. Many of these changes affect the hydrological cycle. Monitoring the storage of freshwater in the Arctic region is essential for understanding the contemporary Earth system state and variability. Variations in Arctic freshwater can induce changes in ocean stratification. Exported southward downstream, these waters have potential future implications for global circulation and heat transport. '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS:''' Since 1993, the Arctic Ocean freshwater has experienced a significant increase of 423 ± 39 km3/year. The year 2016 witnessed the highest freshwater content in the Artic since the last 24 years. Second half of 2016 and first half of 2017 show a substantial decrease of the FW storage. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00193
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'''DEFINITION''' Ocean heat content (OHC) is defined here as the deviation from a reference period (1993-2014) and is closely proportional to the average temperature change from z1 = 0 m to z2 = 700 m depth: OHC=∫_(z_1)^(z_2)▒ρ_0 c_p (T_yr-T_clim )dz [1] with a reference density of = 1030 kgm-3 and a specific heat capacity of cp = 3980 J kg-1 °C-1 (e.g. von Schuckmann et al., 2009). Time series of annual mean values area averaged ocean heat content is provided for the Mediterranean Sea (30°N, 46°N; 6°W, 36°E) and is evaluated for topography deeper than 300m. '''CONTEXT''' Knowing how much and where heat energy is stored and released in the ocean is essential for understanding the contemporary Earth system state, variability and change, as the oceans shape our perspectives for the future (Faizal and Rafiuddin, 2011). The quality evaluation of MEDSEA_OMI_OHC_area_averaged_anomalies is based on the “multi-product” approach as introduced in the second issue of the Ocean State Report (von Schuckmann et al., 2018), and following the MyOcean’s experience (Masina et al., 2017). Six global products and a regional (Mediterranean Sea) product have been used to build an ensemble mean, and its associated ensemble spread. The reference products are: The Mediterranean Sea Reanalysis at 1/24 degree horizontal resolution (MEDSEA_MULTIYEAR_PHY_006_004, DOI: https://doi.org/10.25423/CMCC/MEDSEA_MULTIYEAR_PHY_006_004_E3R1, Escudier et al., 2020) Four global reanalyses at 1/4 degree horizontal resolution (GLOBAL_REANALYSIS_PHY_001_031): GLORYS, C-GLORS, ORAS5, FOAM Two observation based products: CORA (INSITU_GLO_TS_REP_OBSERVATIONS_013_001_b) and ARMOR3D (GLOBAL_REP_PHY_001_021). Details on the products are delivered in the PUM and QUID of this OMI. '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' The ensemble mean ocean heat content anomaly time series over the Mediterranean Sea shows a continuous increase in the period 1993-2018 at rate of 1.5±0.2 W/m2 in the upper 700m. After 2005 the rate has clearly increased with respect the previous decade, in agreement with Iona et al. (2018). '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00261
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'''DEFINITION''' The OMI_EXTREME_WAVE_BALTIC_swh_mean_and_anomaly_obs indicator is based on the computation of the 99th and the 1st percentiles from in situ data (observations). It is computed for the variable significant wave height (swh) measured by in situ buoys. The use of percentiles instead of annual maximum and minimum values, makes this extremes study less affected by individual data measurement errors. The percentiles are temporally averaged, and the spatial evolution is displayed, jointly with the anomaly in the target year. This study of extreme variability was first applied to sea level variable (Pérez Gómez et al 2016) and then extended to other essential variables, sea surface temperature and significant wave height (Pérez Gómez et al 2018). '''CONTEXT''' Projections on Climate Change foresee a future with a greater frequency of extreme sea states (Stott, 2016; Mitchell, 2006). The damages caused by severe wave storms can be considerable not only in infrastructure and buildings but also in the natural habitat, crops and ecosystems affected by erosion and flooding aggravated by the extreme wave heights. In addition, wave storms strongly hamper the maritime activities, especially in harbours. These extreme phenomena drive complex hydrodynamic processes, whose understanding is paramount for proper infrastructure management, design and maintenance (Goda, 2010). In recent years, there have been several studies searching possible trends in wave conditions focusing on both mean and extreme values of significant wave height using a multi-source approach with model reanalysis information with high variability in the time coverage, satellite altimeter records covering the last 30 years and in situ buoy measured data since the 1980s decade but with sparse information and gaps in the time series (e.g. Dodet et al., 2020; Timmermans et al., 2020; Young & Ribal, 2019). These studies highlight a remarkable interannual, seasonal and spatial variability of wave conditions and suggest that the possible observed trends are not clearly associated with anthropogenic forcing (Hochet et al. 2021, 2023). In the Baltic Sea, the particular bathymetry and geography of the basin intensify the seasonal and spatial fluctuations in wave conditions. No clear statistically significant trend in the sea state has been appreciated except a rising trend in significant wave height in winter season, linked with the reduction of sea ice coverage (Soomere, 2023; Tuomi et al., 2019). '''COPERNICUS MARINE SERVICE KEY FINDINGS''' The mean 99th percentiles shown in the area are from 3 to 4 meters and the standard deviation ranges from 0.2 m to 0.4 m. Results for this year show a slight positive or negative anomaly in all the stations, from -0.24 m to +0.36 m, inside the margin of the standard deviation. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00199
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'''DEFINITION''' The temporal evolution of thermosteric sea level in an ocean layer (here: 0-700m) is obtained from an integration of temperature driven ocean density variations, which are subtracted from a reference climatology (here 1993-2014) to obtain the fluctuations from an average field. The regional thermosteric sea level values from 1993 to close to real time are then averaged from 60°S-60°N aiming to monitor interannual to long term global sea level variations caused by temperature driven ocean volume changes through thermal expansion as expressed in meters (m). '''CONTEXT''' The global mean sea level is reflecting changes in the Earth’s climate system in response to natural and anthropogenic forcing factors such as ocean warming, land ice mass loss and changes in water storage in continental river basins (IPCC, 2019). Thermosteric sea-level variations result from temperature related density changes in sea water associated with volume expansion and contraction (Storto et al., 2018). Global thermosteric sea level rise caused by ocean warming is known as one of the major drivers of contemporary global mean sea level rise (WCRP, 2018). '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' Since the year 1993 the upper (0-700m) near-global (60°S-60°N) thermosteric sea level rises at a rate of 1.5±0.1 mm/year.
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'''DEFINITION''' The ibi_omi_tempsal_sst_trend product includes the Sea Surface Temperature (SST) trend for the Iberia-Biscay-Irish Seas over the period 1993-2020, i.e. the rate of change (°C/year). This OMI is derived from the CMEMS REP ATL L4 SST product (SST_ATL_SST_L4_REP_OBSERVATIONS_010_026), see e.g. the OMI QUID, http://marine.copernicus.eu/documents/QUID/CMEMS-OMI-QUID-ATL-SST.pdf), which provided the SSTs used to compute the SST trend over the Iberia-Biscay-Irish Seas. This reprocessed product consists of daily (nighttime) interpolated 0.05° grid resolution SST maps built from the ESA Climate Change Initiative (CCI) (Merchant et al., 2019) and Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) initiatives. Trend analysis has been performed by using the X-11 seasonal adjustment procedure (see e.g. Pezzulli et al., 2005), which has the effect of filtering the input SST time series acting as a low bandpass filter for interannual variations. Mann-Kendall test and Sens’s method (Sen 1968) were applied to assess whether there was a monotonic upward or downward trend and to estimate the slope of the trend and its 95% confidence interval. '''CONTEXT''' Sea surface temperature (SST) is identified as Essential Climate Variable (GCOS 2010), as it is used to analyze and monitor climate variability and change (e.g. Deser et al., 2010). In addition, SST anomalies are used for the analysis of extreme events (marine heatwaves, Hobday et al., 2018). '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' Over the period 1993-2020, most of the Iberia-Biscay-Irish Seas area shows overall surface warming, particularly in the northeastern part of the region. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00257
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'''DEFINITION''' The subsurface temperature trends have been derived from regional reanalysis results for the Baltic Sea (product references BALTICSEA_REANALYSIS_PHY_003_011). Horizontal averaging has been conducted over the Baltic Sea domain (13 °E - 31 °E and 53 °N - 66 °N; excluding the Skagerrak strait). The temperature trend has been obtained through a linear fit for each time series of horizontally averaged annual temperature and at each depth level (Mulet et al., 2018). '''CONTEXT''' The Baltic Sea is a semi-enclosed sea in North-Eastern Europe. The temperature of the upper mixed layer of the Baltic Sea is characterized by a strong seasonal cycle driven by the annual course of solar radiation (Leppäranta and Myrberg, 2008). The maximum water temperatures in the upper layer are reached in July and August and the minimum during February, when the Baltic Sea becomes partially frozen (CMEMS OMI Baltic Sea Sea Ice Extent, CMEMS OMI Baltic Sea Sea Ice Volume). Seasonal thermocline, developing in the depth range of 10-30 m in spring, reaches its maximum strength in summer and is eroded in autumn. During autumn and winter the Baltic Sea is thermally mixed down to the permanent halocline in the depth range of 60-80 meters (Matthäus, 1984). The 20–50 m thick cold intermediate layer forms below the upper mixed layer in March and is observed until October within the 15-65 m depth range (Chubarenko and Stepanova, 2018; Liblik and Lips, 2011). The deep layers of the Baltic Sea are disconnected from the ventilated upper ocean layers, and temperature variations are predominantly driven by mixing processes and horizontal advection. A warming trend of the sea surface waters is positively correlated with the increasing trend of diffuse attenuation of light (Kd490) and satellite-detected chlorophyll concentration (Kahru et al., 2016). Temperature increase in the water column could accelerate oxygen consumption during organic matter oxidation (Savchuk, 2018). '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' The subsurface temperature over the 1993-2020 period shows warming trends of about 0.05 °C/year at all depths. The largest warming trend of 0.06 °C/year is recorded at the 20 m depth, which corresponds to seasonal thermocline. Similar positive trend is at the depth of 60-70 meters, which corresponds to the depth of the upper part of the permanent halocline. A positive trend in the sea surface waters has been detected since the 1990s (BACCII Author Team, 2015) as well as a decreasing trend of the start day of the spring phytoplankton bloom (Raudsepp et al., 2019; Kahru et al., 2016). From the measurements Savchuk (2018) has calculated the temperature trend of 0.04◦oC/year since 1979 on average in the deep layers (>60m) of the Baltic Proper. '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00208
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'''DEFINITION''' The Strong Wave Incidence index is proposed to quantify the variability of strong wave conditions in the Iberia-Biscay-Ireland regional seas. The anomaly of exceeding a threshold of Significant Wave Height is used to characterize the wave behavior. A sensitivity test of the threshold has been performed evaluating the differences using several ones (percentiles 75, 80, 85, 90, and 95). From this indicator, it has been chosen the 90th percentile as the most representative, coinciding with the state-of-the-art. Two CMEMS products are used to compute the Strong Wave Incidence index: • IBI-WAV-MYP: IBI_REANALYSIS_WAV_005_006 • IBI-WAV-NRT: IBI_ANALYSIS_FORECAST_WAV_005_005 The Strong Wave Incidence index (SWI) is defined as the difference between the climatic frequency of exceedance (Fclim) and the observational frequency of exceedance (Fobs) of the threshold defined by the 90th percentile (ThP90) of Significant Wave Height (SWH) computed on a monthly basis from hourly data of IBI-WAV-MYP product: SWI = Fobs(SWH > ThP90) – Fclim(SWH > ThP90) Since the Strong Wave Incidence index is defined as a difference of a climatic mean and an observed value, it can be considered an anomaly. Such index represents the percentage that the stormy conditions have occurred above/below the climatic average. Thus, positive/negative values indicate the percentage of hourly data that exceed the threshold above/below the climatic average, respectively. '''CONTEXT''' Ocean waves have a high relevance for coastal ecosystems and humans. Extreme wave events can entail severe impacts over human infrastructures and coastal dynamics as expressed through he incidence of severe (90th percentile) wave events . The Strong Wave Incidence index based on the CMEMS regional analysis and reanalysis product provides information on the frequency of severe wave events. The IBI-MFC covers the European Atlantic coast in a region bounded by the 26ºN and 56ºN parallels, and the 19ºW and 5ºE meridians. The western European coast is located at the end of the long fetch of the subpolar North Atlantic (Mørk et al., 2010), one of the world’s greatest wave generating regions (Folley, 2017). Several studies have analyzed changes of the ocean wave variability in the North Atlantic Ocean (Bacon and Carter, 1991; Kursnir et al., 1997; WASA Group, 1998; Bauer, 2001; Wang and Swail, 2004; Dupuis et al., 2006; Wolf and Woolf, 2006; Dodet et al., 2010; Young et al., 2011; Young and Ribal, 2019). The observed variability is composed of fluctuations ranging from the weather scale to the seasonal scale, together with long-term fluctuations on interannual to decadal scales associated with large-scale climate oscillations. Since the ocean surface state is mainly driven by wind stresses, part of this variability in Iberia-Biscay-Ireland region is connected to the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index (Bacon and Carter, 1991; Hurrell, 1995; Bouws et al., 1996, Bauer, 2001; Woolf et al., 2002; Tsimplis et al., 2005; Gleeson et al., 2017). However, later studies have quantified the relationships between the wave climate and other atmospheric climate modes such as the East Atlantic pattern, the Arctic Oscillation pattern, the East Atlantic Western Russian pattern and the Scandinavian pattern (Izaguirre et al., 2011, Matínez-Asensio et al., 2016). The Strong Wave Incidence index provides information on incidence of stormy events in four monitoring regions in the IBI domain. The selected monitoring regions are aimed to provide a summarized view of the diverse climatic conditions in the IBI regional domain: Wav1 region monitors the influence of stormy conditions in the West coast of Iberian Peninsula, Wav2 region is devoted to monitor the variability of stormy conditions in the Bay of Biscay, Wav3 region is focused in the northern half of IBI domain, this region is strongly affected by the storms transported by the subpolar front, and Wav4 is focused in the influence of marine storms in the North-East African Coast, the Gulf of Cadiz and Canary Islands. More details and a full scientific evaluation can be found in the CMEMS Ocean State report (Pascual et al., 2020). '''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS''' The analysis of the index in the last decades do not show significant trends of the strong wave conditions over the period 1992-2019 with 99% confidence. The maximum wave event reported in region WAV1 (B) occurred in February 2014, it produced an increment of 34% of strong wave conditions in the region. The maximum wave event found in WAV2 (C) implied an increment of 30% of high wave conditions in February 2014; additionally, the region show another significant storm in November 2009 that produced an increment of 28% of high wave conditions. As in regions WAV1 and WAV2, in the region WAV3 (D), a strong wave event took place in February 2014, this event is the maximum event reported in the region with an increment of strong wave conditions of 22%, two months before (December 2013) there was a storm of similar characteristics affecting this region. The region WAV4 (E) present its maximum wave event in December 2000, such event produced a 33% of increment of strong wave conditions in the region. Despite of each monitoring region is affected by independent wave events; the analysis shows several past higher-than-average wave events that were propagated though several monitoring regions: November-December 2010 (WAV3 and WAV2); February 2014 (WAV1, WAV2, and WAV3); and November-December 2019 (WAV1 and WAV4). The analysis of the NRT period (2020 onwards) depicts a significant stormy event affecting the WAV3 region in February 2020 (increment of 20% of high wave conditions). '''DOI (product):''' https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00251