Funding is provided to conduct a large coordinated experiment near the Hawaiian Ridge to determine whether sites with rough topography are responsible for the mixing of the global ocean. The goals are to identify the major energy pathways for ocean mixing and achieve an approximate energy budget for the region. A companion modeling effort will focus primarily on the issue of tidal scattering as an energy source for ocean mixing while a historical analysis of data collected in the vicinity of the Hawaiian Islands will help guide the survey program in determining the location and ubiquity of regions where strong mixing activity takes place. Under this particular component of the Farfield experiment, a tomographic array will be deployed on either side of the Hawaiian ridge to quantify the barotropic energy flux convergence at the ridge and the flux divergence associated with low mode baroclinic waves radiation. The difference is a measure of the tidal power available for mixing at the Ridge.
