Estimates of Atlantic meridional heat transport from spatiotemporal fusion of Argo, altimetry and gravimetry data

This data set contains the estimates presented in:

Calafat, F. M., Vallivattathillam, P., and Frajka-Williams, E. (2025). Estimates of Atlantic meridional heat transport from spatiotemporal fusion of Argo, altimetry and GRACE data. under review.

Please cite the paper above when using this data set.

Data description:

This data set contains observation-based probabilistic estimates of non-seasonal meridional heat transport (3-month means) at 12 latitudes across the Atlantic Ocean between 65N and 35S. It also contains estimates of heat transport convergence in each latitudinally-bounded region. These estimates have been obtained by combining observations from hydrography, altimetry and gravimetry together with surface heat flux data using a spatiotemporal Bayesian hierarchical model. Heat transport convergences have been inferred from ocean heat budgets over latitudinally-bounded regions, whereas the meridional heat transport across the corresponding latitude lines has been estimated by meridionally integrating the convergences. In doing this, the meridional heat transport at 65N has been set equal to zero and a time-mean value of 0.506 PW has been added to the transport at 60N based on estimates from the OSNAP project.

This data set includes three different solutions based on the three surface heat flux products (DEEPC, ERA5 and NCEP):- Bayesian_estimates_Atlantic_MHT_DEEPC.nc   (period 2004-2017)- Bayesian_estimates_Atlantic_MHT_ERA5.nc    (period 2004-2020) - Bayesian_estimates_Atlantic_MHT_NCEP.nc    (period 2004-2020)

This work has been carried out within the framework of the EPOC project funded by the European Union's Horizon Europe programme (grant agreement No 101059547), under call HORIZON-CL6-2021-CLIMATE01.