Tropical Cyclones Related Wind Power on Oceanic Near‐Inertial Oscillations

Abstract

Abstract Wind power input to oceanic near‐inertial oscillations (NIOs) plays a crucial role in sustaining the global ocean conveyor belt. However, the impact of tropical cyclones (TCs) on wind power input to NIOs, despite being the most vigorous atmospheric dynamics capable of exciting NIOs, is often overlooked in global estimations due to their transient nature and a lack of observations. Utilizing hourly wind and ocean current records, we quantified the wind power on NIOs induced by TCs from 1990 to 2019. Our findings reveal that the wind power on NIOs due to TCs is estimated to be between 0.028 and 0.065 TW, which accounts for a significant proportion, that is, 8%–17%, of that over the globe. This study highlights the importance of incorporating the wind power induced by TCs when estimating the global wind power on NIOs, as its impact is non‐negligible. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of the global energy balance by improving the estimation of wind power on NIOs.

Keywords

• tropical cyclones
• near‐inertial oscillations
• wind power
• drifter
• ocean currents