The relationship between gas exchange and wind speed is used extensively for estimating bulk fluxes of atmospheric gases across the air-sea interface. Here, I provide an update on the frequently used method of Wanninkhof (1992). The update of the methodology reflects advances that have occurred over the past two decades in quantifying the input parameters. The general principle of obtaining a relationship constrained by the globally integrated bomb-14CO2 flux into the ocean remains unchanged. The improved relationship is created using revised global ocean 14C inventories and improved wind speed products. Empirical relationships of the Schmidt number, which are necessary to determine the fluxes, are extended to 40°C to facilitate their use in the models. The focus is on the gas exchange of carbon dioxide, but the suggested functionality can be extended to other gases at intermediate winds (≈4−15 m s−1). The updated relationship, expressed as k = 0.251 (Sc/660)−0.5 where k is the gas transfer velocity, is the average squared wind speed, and Sc is the Schmidt number, has a 20% uncertainty. The relationship is in close agreement with recent parameterizations based on results from gas exchange process studies over the ocean.

https://aslopubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.4319/lom.2014.12.351

Relationship between wind speed and gas exchange over the ocean revisited

Using recent laboratory and field results we explore the possibility of a cubic relationship between gas exchange and instantaneous (or short-term) wind speed, and its impact on global air-sea fluxes. The theoretical foundation for such a dependency is based on retardation of gas transfer at low to intermediate winds by surfactants, which are ubiquitous in the world's oceans, and bubble-enhanced transfer at higher winds. The proposed cubic relationship shows a weaker dependence of gas transfer at low wind speed and a significantly stronger dependence at high wind speed than previous relationships. A long-term relationship derived from such a dependence, combined with the monthly CO2 climatology of Takahashi [1997], leads to an increase in the global annual oceanic CO2 uptake from 1.4 Gigaton C yr−1 to 2.2 Gigaton C yr−1. Although a cubic relationship fits within global bomb-14C oceanic uptake constraints, additional checks are warranted, particularly at high wind speeds where the enhancement is most pronounced.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/1999GL900363

A cubic relationship between air-sea CO2 exchange and wind speed

The past decade has seen a substantial amount of research on air-sea gas exchange and its environmental controls. These studies have significantly advanced the understanding of processes that control gas transfer, led to higher quality field measurements, and improved estimates of the flux of climate-relevant gases between the ocean and atmosphere. This review discusses the fundamental principles of air-sea gas transfer and recent developments in gas transfer theory, parameterizations, and measurement techniques in the context of the exchange of carbon dioxide. However, much of this discussion is applicable to any sparingly soluble, non-reactive gas. We show how the use of global variables of environmental forcing that have recently become available and gas exchange relationships that incorporate the main forcing factors will lead to improved estimates of global and regional air-sea gas fluxes based on better fundamental physical, chemical, and biological foundations.

/pdf/advances-in-quantifying-air-sea-gas-exchange-and-4tk362q7zi.pdf

Advances in Quantifying Air-Sea Gas Exchange and Environmental Forcing*

Sea salt aerosol (SSA) exerts a major influence over a broad reach of geophysics. It is important to the physics and chemistry of the marine atmosphere and to marine geochemistry and biogeochemistry generally. It affects visibility, remote sensing, atmospheric chemistry, and air quality. Sea salt aerosol particles interact with other atmospheric gaseous and aerosol constituents by acting as sinks for condensable gases and suppressing new particle formation, thus influencing the size distribution of these other aerosols and more broadly influencing the geochemical cycles of substances with which they interact. As the key aerosol constituent over much of Earth's surface at present, and all the more so in pre-industrial times, SSA is central to description of Earth's aerosol burden.

Sea Salt Aerosol Production: Mechanisms, Methods, Measurements, and Models - A Critical Review

Equilibration in the aftermath of the lunar-forming giant impact

Laboratory results have demonstrated that bubble plumes are a very efficient air-water gas transfer mechanism. Because breaking waves generate bubble plumes, it could be possible to correlate the air-sea gas transport velocity kL with whitecap coverage. This correlation would then allow kL to be predicted from measurements of apparent microwave brightness temperature through the increase in sea surface microwave emissivity associated with breaking waves. In order to develop this remote-sensing-based method for predicting air-sea gas fluxes, a whitecap simulation tank was used to measure evasive and invasive kL values for air-seawater transfer of carbon dioxide, oxygen, helium, sulfur hexafluoride, and dimethyl sulfide at cleaned and surfactant-influenced water surfaces. An empirical model has been developed that can predict kL from bubble plume coverage, diffusivity, and solubility. The observed dependence of kL on molecular diffusivity and aqueous-phase solubility agrees with the predictions of modeling studies of bubble-driven air-water gas transfer. It has also been shown that soluble surfactants can decrease kL even in the presence of breaking waves.

/pdf/the-influence-of-bubble-plumes-on-air-seawater-gas-transfer-4cm57no9v8.pdf

The influence of bubble plumes on air-seawater gas transfer velocities

Bubble populations and gas transfer velocities were measured in cleaned and surfactant-influenced freshwater and seawater. A nonlinear fitting technique was used to partition the total gas transfer velocity for a gas in each water type into a turbulence- and bubble-mediated fraction. This showed that the bubble-mediated transfer fraction was larger in cleaned freshwater than in cleaned seawater and that the difference was a function of diffusivity and solubility. This was explained by the fact that the bubble measurements showed that bubble plumes in cleaned freshwater had a higher concentration of large bubbles and a lower concentration of small bubbles than the plumes in cleaned seawater. The differences between the behavior of the bubble-mediated gas flux in cleaned freshwater and cleaned seawater show that caution should be used when intercomparing laboratory results from measurements made in different media. These differences also will make parameterizations of bubble-mediated gas exchange developed using freshwater laboratory data difficult to apply directly to oceanic conditions. It was found that adding a surfactant to seawater had minimal impact on the concentration of bubbles in the plumes. Because surfactants decrease the gas flux to the individual bubbles, the similarity in bubble population meant that the addition of surfactant to seawater decreased the bubble-mediated gas flux compared to the flux in cleaned seawater. In contrast, the addition of a surfactant to freshwater increased the concentration of bubbles by over an order of magnitude. This increase in bubble population was large enough to offset the decrease in the flux to the individual bubbles so that the net bubble-mediated gas flux in freshwater increased when surfactant was added. This difference in behavior of the bubble population and bubble-mediated transfer velocity between surfactant-influenced and cleaned waters further complicates interrelating laboratory measurements and applying laboratory results to the ocean.

On the differences between bubble-mediated air-water transfer in freshwater and seawater

Air-sea gas exchange is an important process in the geochemical cycling of carbon dioxide (CO{sub 2}). The air-sea flux of CO{sub 2} is determined in part by the physical forcing functions, which are parameterized in terms of the air-sea transfer velocity, k{sub L}. Past studies have attempted to correlate k{sub L} with wind speed, U. Because strong winds occur in ocean regions thought to be important sources or sinks of CO{sub 2}, accurate knowledge of k{sub L} at high U is important in estimating the global air-sea flux of CO{sub 2}. Better understanding of the physical processes affecting gas transfer at large U will increase the accuracy in estimating k{sub L} in ocean regions with high CO{sub 2}, fluxes. Increased accuracy in estimating k{sub L} will increase the accuracy in calculating the net global air-sea CO{sub 2} flux and provide more accurate boundary and initial conditions for global ocean carbon cycle models. High wind speeds are associated with the presence of whitecaps, which can increase the gas flux by generating turbulence, disrupting surface films, and creating bubble plumes. Bubble plumes will create additional turbulence, prolong the surface disruption, and transfer gas to or from individual bubbles while they are beneath the surface. These turbulence and bubble processes very effectively promote gas transfer. Because of this, it is postulated that breaking waves, if present, will dominate non-whitecap related gas exchange. Under this assumption, k{sub L} Will increase linearly with increasing fractional area whitecap coverage, W{sub c}. In support of this, researchers found k{sub L} measured in a whitecap simulation tank (WSI) was linearly correlated with bubble plume coverage, B{sub c} (the laboratory analog of W{sub c}). However, it is not definitively known how the presence of breaking waves and bubble plumes affect the dependence of k{sub L} on Schmidt number, Sc, and aqueous-phase solubility, {alpha}.

/pdf/the-influence-of-bubble-plumes-on-air-seawater-gas-transfer-1s03kc3t70.pdf

Laboratory results have demonstrated the importance of bubble plumes to air-water gas transfer (Asher et al, 1994) Bubble plumes enhance gas transfer by disrupting surface films, by directly transporting a gas, and by the creation of turbulence Models of bubble gas transfer have been developed by different authors (Atkinson, 1973; Memery and Merlivat, 1985; Woolf and Thorpe, 1991) to determine the magnitude of gas transfer due to bubbles Laboratory measurements of both the gas transfer rate k{sub L}, and the bubble distribution {phi} in a whitecap simulation tank (WST) have allowed these models to be validated and deficiencies in the theoretical assumptions to be explored In the WST, each bucket tip simulates a wave breaking event Important tests of these models include whether they can explain the experimentally determined solubility and Schmidt number dependency of k{sub L}, predict the time varying bubble concentrations, predict the evasion-invasion asymmetry, and predict the fraction of k{sub L} due to bubble plumes Four different models were tested, a steady state model (Atkinson, 1973), a non-turbulence model with constant bubble radius (Memery and Merlivat, 1985), a turbulence model with constant bubble radius (Wolf and Thorpe, 1991), and a turbulence model with varying bubble radius All models simulated multiple bubble tip cycles The two turbulence models were run for sufficient tip cycles to generate statistically significant number of eddies ({number_sign}{gt}50) for bubbles affected by turbulence (V{sub B}{le}V{sub T}), found to be at least four tip cycles The models allowed up to nine gases simultaneously and were run under different conditions of trace and major gas concentrations and partial pressures

/pdf/validation-study-of-air-sea-gas-transfer-modeling-x883ft059r.pdf

W. E. Asher

Papers

The influence of bubble plumes on air-seawater gas transfer velocities

On the differences between bubble-mediated air-water transfer in freshwater and seawater

The influence of bubble plumes on air-seawater gas transfer velocities

Validation study of air-sea gas transfer modeling