Regional chlorophyll a algorithms in the Arctic Ocean and their effect on satellite-derived primary production estimates

The Arctic is warming at approximately twice the global rate in response to anthropogenic climate change, resulting in disappearing sea ice, increased open water area, and a longer growing season (IPCC, 2013). This loss of sea ice has resulted in a 30% increase in annual net primary production (NPP)...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Deep-sea research. Part II, Topical studies in oceanography Topical studies in oceanography, 2016-08, Vol.130, p.14-27
Main Authors: Lewis, K.M., Mitchell, B.G., van Dijken, G.L., Arrigo, K.R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Algorithms
Arctic Ocean
Brackish
Case 2 water
CDOM
Chukchi Sea
Errors
Marine
Ocean color
Ocean color algorithm
Phytoplankton
Pigment packaging
Primary production
Remote sensing
Satellites
Shelves
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Summary:The Arctic is warming at approximately twice the global rate in response to anthropogenic climate change, resulting in disappearing sea ice, increased open water area, and a longer growing season (IPCC, 2013). This loss of sea ice has resulted in a 30% increase in annual net primary production (NPP) by Arctic Ocean phytoplankton between 1998 and 2012 (Arrigo and van Dijken, 2015). To quantify NPP, many algorithms require input of chlorophyll a (Chl a) concentration, which serves as a biomass proxy for phytoplankton. While satellites provide temporally and spatially extensive data, including Chl a, the standard global ocean color algorithms are prone to errors in Arctic Ocean waters due to higher than average phytoplankton pigment-packaging and chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM) concentrations. Here, we evaluate retrievals of Chl a using existing ocean color algorithms, test and develop a new empirical ocean color algorithm for use in the Chukchi Sea, and evaluate the effect of using different satellite Chl a products as input to an NPP algorithm. Our results show that in the Chukchi Sea, Chl a was overestimated by the global algorithm (MODIS OC3Mv6) at concentrations lower than 0.9mgm−3 because of contamination by CDOM absorption, but underestimated at higher concentrations because of pigment packaging. Only within the in situ Chl a range of 0.6–2mgam−3 was the satellite retrieval error by the OC3Mv6 algorithm below the ocean color community goal of
ISSN:0967-0645
1879-0100
DOI:10.1016/j.dsr2.2016.04.020