A methodological approach to the air-sea energy fluxes data collection and analysis at the tropical coastal ocean

Abstract The southern South China coastal oceans within the South East Asian region are much lacking in the perception of the surface energy budget and evaporation over the ocean waters in response to climatic changes. The eddy covariance method was used to measure the energy fluxes, microclimate variables, and surface water temperature from November 2015 to October 2017 at the Straits of Malacca, South China Sea; Pulau Pinang, Malaysia, situated at latitude 5°28′06″N, and longitude 100°12′01″E. This work focused on the methodological approach to the air-sea energy fluxes data collection and analysis. In this regard, the method applied for the direct measurements and analysis of energy fluxes and other meteorological parameters in the site is considered and reported. • The paper summarizes the analysis of energy fluxes, microclimate variables, and surface water temperature data in a tropical coastal ocean station using the eddy covariance method. • The methodological approach illustrates the method of analysis applied in this study which can be compared and used for similar studies in other places. • The reproducible data analysis technique matches similar comparative methods such as Matlab and Python.