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This study evaluates the anthropogenic changes of CO2 (ΔCant) and δ13C (Δδ13Cant) in the Nordic seas, the northern limb of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, that took place between 1981 and 2002/2003. The changes have been determined by comparing data obtained during the Transient Tracers in the Ocean, North Atlantic Study (TTO-NAS) with data obtained during the Nordic seas surveys of R/V Knorr in 2002 and R/V G.O. Sars in 2003 using an extended multilinear regression approach. The estimated Δδ13Cant and ΔCant and their relationship to each other and to water mass distribution suggest that the Polar Water entering the Nordic seas from the north is undersaturated with respect to the present atmospheric anthropogenic CO2 levels and promotes a local uptake of Cant within the Nordic seas. In contrast, the Atlantic Water entering from the south appears equilibrated. It carries with it anthropogenic carbon which will be sequestered at depth as the water overturns. This preequilibration leaves no room for further uptake of Cant in the parts of the Nordic seas dominated by Atlantic Water. The upper ocean pCO2 in these regions appears to have increased at a greater rate than the atmospheric pCO2 over the last 2 decades; this is reconcilable with a large lateral advective supply of Cant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gridded fields of sea surface temperature (SST), sea level pressure (SLP), and wind speed were used in combination with data for the atmospheric mole fraction of CO2 and an empirical relationship between measured values of the fugacity of carbon dioxide in surface water and SST, to calculate the air–sea CO2 flux in the northern North Atlantic. The flux was calculated for each of the months October–March, in the time period 1981 until 2001, allowing for an assessment of the interannual variations in the region. Locally and on a monthly time scale, the interannual variability of the flux could be as high as ±100% in regions seasonally covered by sea ice. However, in open-ocean areas the variability was normally between ±20% and ±40%. The interannual variability was found to be approximately halved when fluxes averaged over each winter season were compared. Summarised over the whole northern North Atlantic, the air to sea carbon flux over winter totalled 0.08 Gton, with an interannual variability of about ±7%. On a monthly basis the interannual variations were slightly higher, about ±8% to ±13%. Changes in wind speed and atmospheric fCO2 (the latter directly related to SLP variations) accounted for most of the interannual variations of the computed air–sea CO2 fluxes. A tendency for increasing CO2 flux into the ocean with increasing values of the NAO index was identified. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]