Estuarine exchange flow in the Salish Sea

Abstract

The Salish Sea is a large, fjordal estuarine system opening onto the northeast Pacific Ocean. It develops a strong estuarine exchange flow that draws in nutrients from the ocean and flushes the system on timescales of several months. It is difficult to apply existing dynamical theories of estuarine circulation there because of the extreme bathymetric complexity. A realistic numerical model of the system was manipulated to have stronger and weaker tides to explore the sensitivity of the exchange flow to tides. This sensitivity was explored over two timescales: annual means and the spring-neap. Two theories for the estuarine exchange flow are: (a) “gravitational circulation” where exchange is driven by the baroclinic pressure gradient due to along-channel salinity variation, and (b) “tidal pumping” where tidal advection combined with flow separation forces the exchange. Past observations suggested gravitational circulation was of leading importance in the Salish Sea. We find here that the exchange flow increases with stronger tides, particularly in annual averages, suggesting it is controlled by tidal pumping. However, the landward salt transport due to the exchange flow decreases with stronger tides because greater mixing decreases the salinity difference between incoming and outgoing water. These results may be characteristic of estuarine systems that have rough topography and strong tides.