For most of the ocean volume away from the boundary layers, which have a characteristic thickness of 100 metres (about 330 feet), frictional forces are of minor importance, and the equation of motion for horizontal forces can be expressed as a simple balance of horizontal pressure gradient and Coriolis force. This is called geostrophic balance.

On a nonrotating Earth, water would be accelerated by a horizontal pressure gradient and would flow from high to low pressure. On the rotating Earth, however, the Coriolis force deflects the motion, and the acceleration ceases only when the speed, U, of the current is just fast enough to produce a Coriolis force that can exactly balance the horizontal pressure-gradient force. This geostrophic balance is given as dp/dx = v2ω sin θ, and dp/dy = –u2 sin, where dp/dx and dp/dy are the horizontal pressure gradient along the x-axis and y-axis, respectively, and u and v are the horizontal components of the velocity U along the x-axis and y-axis, respectively. From this balance it follows that the current direction must be perpendicular to the pressure gradient because the Coriolis force always acts perpendicular to the motion. In the Northern Hemisphere this direction is such that the high pressure is to the right when looking in current direction, while in the Southern Hemisphere it is to the left. This type of current is called a geostrophic current. The simple equation given above provides the basis for an indirect method of computing ocean currents. The relief of the sea surface also defines the streamlines (paths) of the geostrophic current at the surface relative to the deep reference level. The hills represent high pressure, and the valleys stand for low pressure. Clockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere with higher pressure in the centre of rotation is called anticyclonic motion. Counterclockwise rotation with lower pressure in its centre is cyclonic motion. In the Southern Hemisphere the sense of rotation is the opposite, because the effect of the Coriolis force has changed its sign of deflection.

Ekman layer

The wind exerts stress on the ocean surface proportional to the square of the wind speed and in the direction of the wind, setting the surface water in motion. This motion extends to a depth of about 100 metres in what is called the Ekman layer, after the Swedish oceanographer V. Walfrid Ekman, who in 1902 deduced these results in a theoretical model constructed to help explain observations of wind drift in the Arctic. Within the oceanic Ekman layer the wind stress is balanced by the Coriolis force and frictional forces. The surface water is directed at an angle of 45° to the wind, to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the Southern Hemisphere. With increasing depth in the boundary layer, the current speed is reduced, and the direction rotates farther away from the wind direction following a spiral form, becoming antiparallel to the surface flow at the base of the layer where the speed is 1/23 of the surface speed. This so-called Ekman spiral may be the exception rather than the rule, as the specific conditions are not often met, though deflection of a wind-driven surface current at somewhat smaller than 45° is observed when the wind field blows with a steady force and direction for the better part of a day. The average water particle within the Ekman layer moves at an angle of 90° to the wind; this movement is to the right of the wind direction in the Northern Hemisphere and to its left in the Southern Hemisphere. This phenomenon is called Ekman transport, and its effects are widely observed in the oceans.

Since the wind varies from place to place, so does the Ekman transport, forming convergence and divergence zones of surface water. A region of convergence forces surface water downward in a process called downwelling, while a region of divergence draws water from below into the surface Ekman layer in a process known as upwelling. Upwelling and downwelling also occur where the wind blows parallel to a coastline. The principal upwelling regions of the world are along the eastern boundary of the subtropical ocean waters, as, for example, the coastal region of Peru and northwestern Africa. Upwelling in these regions cools the surface water and brings nutrient-rich subsurface water into the sunlit layer of the ocean, resulting in a biologically productive region. Upwelling and high productivity also are found along divergence zones at the Equator and around Antarctica. The primary downwelling regions are in the subtropical ocean waters—e.g., the Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic. Such areas are devoid of nutrients and are poor in marine life.

The vertical movements of ocean waters into or out of the base of the Ekman layer amount to less than 1 metre (about 3.3 feet) per day, but they are important since they extend the wind-driven effects into deeper waters. Within an upwelling region, the water column below the Ekman layer is drawn upward. This process, with conservation of angular momentum on the rotating Earth, induces the water column to drift toward the poles. Conversely, downwelling forces water into the water column below the Ekman layer, inducing drift toward the Equator. An additional consequence of upwelling and downwelling for stratified waters is to create a baroclinic field of mass. Surface water is less dense than deeper water. Ekman convergences have the effect of accumulating less dense surface water. This water floats above the surrounding water, forming a hill in sea level and driving an anticyclonic geostrophic current that extends well below the Ekman layer. Divergences do the opposite: they remove the less dense surface water, replacing it with denser, deeper water. This induces a depression in sea level with a cyclonic geostrophic current.

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Water and its Varying Forms

The ocean current pattern produced by the wind-induced Ekman transport is called the Sverdrup transport, after the Norwegian oceanographer H.U. Sverdrup, who formulated the basic theory in 1947. Several years later (1950) the American geophysicist and oceanographer Walter H. Munk and others expanded Sverdrup’s work, explaining many of the major features of the wind-driven general circulation by using the mean climatological wind stress distribution at the sea surface as a driving force.