Overview

The TropFlux project aims at providing daily, timely, accurate air-sea heat flux data for the entire 30°N-30°S region.

The four components of net surface heat flux are currently available for the entire 1989-2010 period. We are currently working on a regular (~monthly) update of the TropFLux product until 3-4 months behind realtime, which should be available by 2012.

TropFlux is largely derived from a combination of ERA-I re-analysis data for turbulent and longwave fluxes, and ISCCP surface radiation data for the shortwave flux. All input products are bias- and amplitude-corrected on the basis of Global Tropical Moored Array data, before surface net heat flux is computed using the COARE v3 bulk algorithm. A precise description of the flux computation procedure, as well as a detailed evaluation against other timely, daily air-sea heat flux alternatives (OAFLUX, NCEP, NCEP2, ERA-I) is provided in Praveen Kumar et al. (2011).

We believe that this product offers the following advantages:

• better variability and less biases than re-analysis fluxes (and equivalent performance to OAFLUX)
• available until the end of 2010, and soon updated every month, lagging realtime by ~3 months
• a simple estimate of surface shortwave radiation is provided from OLR data, as a near-realtime alternative to the more accurate but irregularly updated ISCCP data

The TropFLux product has been developed under a collaboration between Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, France and National Institute of Oceanography, India.