Long Term Sea Level Change and Water Mass Balance in the South China Sea

作     者：RONG Zengrui LIU Yuguang ZONG Haibo XIU Peng 

作者机构：Physical Oceanography Laboratory Ocean University of China Qingdao 266100 P. R. China 

出 版 物：《Journal of Ocean University of China》 (中国海洋大学学报（英文版）)

年 卷 期：2009年第8卷第4期

页      面：327-334页

学科分类：0709[理学-地质学] 070901[理学-矿物学、岩石学、矿床学] 07[理学] 0707[理学-海洋科学] 

基　　金：supported by the National Basic Research Program of China through Grant No. 973-2007CB- 411807 

主　　题：sea level change South China Sea thermosteric sea level mass exchange 

摘      要：Sea level anomalies observed by altimeter during the 1993-2006 period, thermosteric sea level anomalies estimated by using subsurface temperature data produced by Ishii and SODA reanalysis data, tide gauge records and HOAPS freshwater flux data were analyzed to investigate the long term sea level change and the water mass balance in the South China Sea, The altime- ter-observed sea level showed a rising rate of （3.5±0.9）mmyr-1 during the period 1993-2006, but this figure was considered to have been highly distorted by the relatively short time interval and the large inter-decadal variability, which apparently exists in both the thermosteric sea level and the observed sea level. Long term thermosteric sea level from 1945 to 2004 gave a rising rate of 0.15±0.06 mmyr-1. Tide gauge＇data revealed this discrepancy and the regional distributions of the sea-level trends. Both the ＇real＇ and the ther- mosteric sea level showed a good correspondence to ENSO： decreasing during El Nino years and increasing during La Nina years. Amplitude and phase differences between the ＇real＇ sea level and the thermosteic sea level were substantially revealed on both sea- sonal and interannual time scales. As one of the possible factors, the freshwater flux might play an important role in balancing the water mass.