Insensitivity to turbulent closure in the wind-driven nonlinear Stommel-Munk model is addressed theoretically and numerically. The QG energy equation is used to show that, with the assumption that the maximum velocities occur at inertial length scales or smaller, a Sverdrup interior is consistent with the small Rossby number assumption only when the frictional parameters exceed critical values. For frictional parameters smaller than these values, valid solutions must decrease the energy source. This is possible for non-Sverdrup solutions since the energy source is dependent on the solution. The steady-state behavior of the model was investigated via a pseudo-arclength continuation algorithm.
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