Impact of the Northern annular mode on the freshwater exchange between the Arctic and the North Atlantic

The variability of the ice and freshwater transports through the main openings of the Nordic Seas is studied based on a 200-year simulation with a sea ice–ocean model forced by stochastic surface wind stress anomalies representative of Northern annular mode (NAM). The spectrum of the ice export through Fram Strait (FS), which constitutes the main contribution to the total freshwater export anomaly from the Arctic, shows no significant peak though half of the variance is concentrated at periods longer than a year. The standard deviation of the freshwater export to the subpolar gyre through Denmark Strait only amounts to 40% of the standard deviation of the total (ice+liquid) freshwater export through FS, with a comparatively larger variance in the low-frequency range, suggesting that the Greenland Sea could act as a low-pass filter. In the upper layer of the Iceland–Scotland Passage, positive phases of the NAM lead to a fast increase of the northward volume and salt transports. Within 2 years, the salt transport anomaly, however, changes sign due to advection of negative salinity anomalies which originate in the subpolar gyre and can be traced up to the Barents Sea.