'''DEFINITION'''

Ocean salt content (OSC) is defined and represented here as the volume average of the integral of salinity in the Mediterranean Sea from z1 = 0 m to z2 = 300 m depth:

¯S=1/V ∫V S dV

Time series of annual mean values area averaged ocean salt content are provided for the Mediterranean Sea (30°N, 46°N; 6°W, 36°E) and are evaluated in the upper 300m excluding the shelf areas close to the coast with a depth less than 300 m. The total estimated volume is approximately 5.7e+5 km3.

'''CONTEXT'''

The freshwater input from the land (river runoff) and atmosphere (precipitation) and inflow from the Black Sea and the Atlantic Ocean are balanced by the evaporation in the Mediterranean Sea. Evolution of the salt content may have an impact in the ocean circulation and dynamics which possibly will have implication on the entire Earth climate system. Thus monitoring changes in the salinity content is essential considering its link to changes in: the hydrological cycle, the water masses formation, the regional halosteric sea level and salt/freshwater transport, as well as for their impact on marine biodiversity.

The OMI_CLIMATE_OSC_MEDSEA_volume_mean is based on the “multi-product” approach introduced in the seventh issue of the Ocean State Report (contribution by Aydogdu et al., 2023). Note that the estimates in Aydogdu et al. (2023) are provided monthly while here we evaluate the results per year.

Six global products and a regional (Mediterranean Sea) product have been used to build an ensemble mean, and its associated ensemble spread. The reference products are:

• The Mediterranean Sea Reanalysis at 1/24°horizontal resolution (MEDSEA_MULTIYEAR_PHY_006_004, DOI: https://doi.org/10.25423/CMCC/MEDSEA_MULTIYEAR_PHY_006_004_E3R1, Escudier et al., 2020)

• Four global reanalyses at 1/4°horizontal resolution (GLOBAL_REANALYSIS_PHY_001_031, GLORYS, C-GLORS, ORAS5, FOAM, DOI: https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00024, Desportes et al., 2022)

• Two observation-based products: CORA (INSITU_GLO_TS_REP_OBSERVATIONS_013_001_b, DOI: https://doi.org/10.17882/46219, Szekely et al., 2022) and ARMOR3D (MULTIOBS_GLO_PHY_TSUV_3D_MYNRT_015_012, DOI: https://doi.org/10.48670/moi-00052, Grenier et al., 2021).

Details on the products are delivered in the PUM and QUID of this OMI.

'''CMEMS KEY FINDINGS'''

The Mediterranean Sea salt content shows a positive trend in the upper 300 m with a continuous increase over the period 1993-2021 at rate of 7.0*10-3 ±3.1*10-4 psu yr-1.

The overall ensemble mean of different products is 38.57 psu. During the early 1990s in the entire Mediterranean Sea there is a large spread in salinity with the observational based datasets showing a higher salinity, while the reanalysis products present relatively lower salinity. The maximum spread between the period 1993–2021 occurs in the 1990s with a value of 0.12 psu, and it decreases to as low as 0.02 psu by the end of the 2010s.

'''DOI (product):'''

https://doi.org/10.48670/mds-00325