An Oceanic Impact of the Kuroshio on Surface Air Temperature on the Pacific Coast of Japan in Summer: Regional H2O Greenhouse Gas Effect

This study used a 4-km resolution regional climate model to examine the sensitivity of surface air temperature on the Pacific coast of Japan to sea surface temperature (SST) south of the Pacific coast of Japan during summer. The authors performed a control simulation (CTL) driven by reanalysis and observational SST datasets. A series of sensitivity experiments using climatological values from the CTL SST datasets over a 31-yr period was conducted. The interannual variation in surface air temperature over the Pacific coast was well simulated in CTL. The interannual variation in SST over the Kuroshio region amplified the interannual variation in surface air temperature over the Pacific coast. It was found that 30% of the total variance of interannual variation in surface air temperature can be controlled by interannual variation in SST. The calculated surface air temperature on the Pacific coast increased by 0.4 K per 1-K SST warming in the Kuroshio region. Note that this sensitivity was considerably greater during nighttime than during daytime. Concurrent with the warming in surface air temperature, downward longwave radiation at the surface was also increased. In summer, the increase in latent heat flux was considerably larger than that in sensible heat flux over the ocean because of SST warming, according to the temperature dependence of the Bowen ratio. This implies that the primary factor for the increase in surface air temperature in summer is increased moisture in the lower troposphere, indicating that the regional warming was caused by an increase in H2O greenhouse gas.