Bio-enrichment by ocean upwelling along the west coast of North America

Primary biological productivity in the coastal ocean is affected by physical oceanography, which in turn is coupled to weather; particularly wind stress, solar heating, and illumination related to photosynthesis. In this paper we begin to put these phenomena together to examine their interrelationships and to estimate the extent to which upwelling enhances productivity along that part of the west coast of North America where it is prominent for a season. Accordingly, the long-term temporal and spatial features of upwelling in ocean waters along the west coast are summarized. In regions of particularly strong upwelling, illustrative ocean observations, measurements, and computations are performed at selected locations spanning more than a decade in time. Results are compared with the results of other studies. Upwelling is shown to enrich biomass as much as fiftyfold. An analytic solution to an approximate set of the rigorous coupled hydrodynamic, energy, radiative transfer, and species conservation equations is presented and described. This includes the effects of weather, wind induced shear stress and its variation (which affect the upwelling formation), illumination (which affects the production of a biomass in surface waters), solar heating, and other physical, chemical, photochemical, and biological events in coastal waters. An approximate analogy (or index) which relates local sea surface temperature and primary productivity parameters in the upwelling formation is discussed. Computed results are compared to NOAA coastal ocean observations.