An intercomparison of monthly surface air temperature on islands and proximate moorings across the tropical Indo-Pacific

Abstract

Despite the importance and vulnerability of small island nations and their ecosystems, they frequently have insufficient observations to provide baseline or long-term perspectives on climate variability and change, and global model experiments rarely have the resolution to include them. Many studies in observational climatology, climate modeling, and paleoclimate thus depend to varying degrees on an approximation equating near-surface marine and terrestrial island climates, often with direct implications for island societies and resources. Here we investigate the validity of this approximation, and by extension the viability of offshore moorings to serve as proxies for island climate variability, by comparing monthly mean observations on a diverse set of 17 islands across the global tropics with those from ocean moorings proximate to each island. While some island-mooring pairs exhibit a mean offset in surface air temperature, these cannot be explained as a simple function of one parameter including distance from the mooring, station elevation, or island dimensions. Overall, the seasonal to interannual variability in near-surface climate at monthly time scales at meteorological stations on tropical islands is captured remarkably well by moorings positioned up to 1,000 km offshore.