Ocean‐atmosphere dynamics in the north Pacific play an important role in the global climate system and influence hydroclimate in western North America. However, changes to this region's mean climate under increased atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations are not well understood. Here we present new alkenone‐based records of sea surface temperature (SST) from the northeast Pacific from the mid‐Piacenzian warm period (approximately 3.3–3.0 Ma), an interval considered to be an analog for near‐future climate under middle‐of‐the‐road anthropogenic emissions. We compare these and other alkenone‐based SST records from the north Pacific to fully‐coupled climate model simulations to examine the impact of mid‐Pliocene CO2and other boundary conditions on regional climate dynamics and to explore factors governing model disagreement about regional temperature patterns. Model performance varies regionally, with Community Earth System Model 1.2 (CESM 1.2) and CESM2 performing best in regions with greater warming like the California Margin, though these models underestimate the warming evidenced in our new proxy record and others from the region. Single forcing simulations reveal a strong influence for prescribed land surface changes and higher CO2levels on coastal warming patterns along the California Margin in CESM2. Furthermore, differences in shortwave and longwave radiation and circulation between the models, likely related to changes in the atmospheric component of the model, may play a key role in the ability of models to capture regionally‐varying patterns of Pliocene warmth. Regional patterns of temperature change inferred from geochemical records could therefore help to understand the impacts of different model parameterization schemes on regional climate patterns.
A spurious increase in the interannual variability of prescribed biomass burning (BB) emissions in the CMIP6 forcing database during the satellite era of wildfire monitoring (1997–2014) is found to lead to warming in the Northern Hemisphere extratropics in simulations with the Community Earth System Model version 2 (CESM2). Using targeted sensitivity experiments with the CESM2 in which prescribed BB emissions are homogenized and variability is removed, we show that the warming is specifically attributable to BB variability from 40° to 70°N and arises from a net thinning of the cloud field and an associated increase in absorbed solar radiation. Our results also demonstrate the potential pitfalls of introducing discontinuities in climate forcing data sets when trying to incorporate novel observations.
more » « less- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10374539
- Publisher / Repository:
- DOI PREFIX: 10.1029
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Volume:
- 49
- Issue:
- 2
- ISSN:
- 0094-8276
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
more » « less
Abstract -
more » « less
Abstract We examine the response of the Community Earth System Model Versions 1 and 2 (CESM1 and CESM2) to abrupt quadrupling of atmospheric CO
2 concentrations (4xCO2) and to 1% annually increasing CO2 concentrations (1%CO2). Different estimates of equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) for CESM1 and CESM2 are presented. All estimates show that the sensitivity of CESM2 has increased by 1.5 K or more over that of CESM1. At the same time the transient climate response (TCR) of CESM1 and CESM2 derived from 1%CO2 experiments has not changed significantly—2.1 K in CESM1 and 2.0 K in CESM2. Increased initial forcing as well as stronger shortwave radiation feedbacks are responsible for the increase in ECS seen in CESM2. A decomposition of regional radiation feedbacks and their contribution to global feedbacks shows that the Southern Ocean plays a key role in the overall behavior of 4xCO2 experiments, accounting for about 50% of the total shortwave feedback in both CESM1 and CESM2. The Southern Ocean is also responsible for around half of the increase in shortwave feedback between CESM1 and CESM2, with a comparable contribution arising over tropical ocean. Experiments using a thermodynamic slab‐ocean model (SOM) yield estimates of ECS that are in remarkable agreement with those from fully coupled Earth system model (ESM) experiments for the same level of CO2 increase. Finally, we show that the similarity of TCR in CESM1 and CESM2 masks significant regional differences in warming that occur in the 1%CO2 experiments for each model. -
null (Ed.)Abstract. The Arctic is warming 2 to 3 times faster than the global average, partly due to changes in short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs) including aerosols. In order to study the effects of atmospheric aerosols in this warming, recent past (1990–2014) and future (2015–2050) simulations have been carried out using the GISS-E2.1 Earth system model to study the aerosol burdens and their radiative and climate impacts over the Arctic (>60∘ N), using anthropogenic emissions from the Eclipse V6b and the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) databases, while global annual mean greenhouse gas concentrations were prescribed and kept fixed in all simulations. Results showed that the simulations have underestimated observed surface aerosol levels, in particular black carbon (BC) and sulfate (SO42-), by more than 50 %, with the smallest biases calculated for the atmosphere-only simulations, where winds are nudged to reanalysis data. CMIP6 simulations performed slightly better in reproducing the observed surface aerosol concentrations and climate parameters, compared to the Eclipse simulations. In addition, simulations where atmosphere and ocean are fully coupled had slightly smaller biases in aerosol levels compared to atmosphere-only simulations without nudging. Arctic BC, organic aerosol (OA), and SO42- burdens decrease significantly in all simulations by 10 %–60 % following the reductions of 7 %–78 % in emission projections, with the Eclipse ensemble showing larger reductions in Arctic aerosol burdens compared to the CMIP6 ensemble. For the 2030–2050 period, the Eclipse ensemble simulated a radiative forcing due to aerosol–radiation interactions (RFARI) of -0.39±0.01 W m−2, which is −0.08 W m−2 larger than the 1990–2010 mean forcing (−0.32 W m−2), of which -0.24±0.01 W m−2 was attributed to the anthropogenic aerosols. The CMIP6 ensemble simulated a RFARI of −0.35 to −0.40 W m−2 for the same period, which is −0.01 to −0.06 W m−2 larger than the 1990–2010 mean forcing of −0.35 W m−2. The scenarios with little to no mitigation (worst-case scenarios) led to very small changes in the RFARI, while scenarios with medium to large emission mitigations led to increases in the negative RFARI, mainly due to the decrease in the positive BC forcing and the decrease in the negative SO42- forcing. The anthropogenic aerosols accounted for −0.24 to −0.26 W m−2 of the net RFARI in 2030–2050 period, in Eclipse and CMIP6 ensembles, respectively. Finally, all simulations showed an increase in the Arctic surface air temperatures throughout the simulation period. By 2050, surface air temperatures are projected to increase by 2.4 to 2.6 ∘C in the Eclipse ensemble and 1.9 to 2.6 ∘C in the CMIP6 ensemble, compared to the 1990–2010 mean. Overall, results show that even the scenarios with largest emission reductions leads to similar impact on the future Arctic surface air temperatures and sea-ice extent compared to scenarios with smaller emission reductions, implying reductions of greenhouse emissions are still necessary to mitigate climate change.more » « less
-
more » « less
Abstract Simulations of 21st century climate with Community Earth System Model version 2 (CESM2) using the standard atmosphere (CAM6), denoted CESM2(CAM6), and the latest generation of the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model (WACCM6), denoted CESM2(WACCM6), are presented, and a survey of general results is described. The equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) of CESM2(CAM6) is 5.3°C, and CESM2(WACCM6) is 4.8°C, while the transient climate response (TCR) is 2.1°C in CESM2(CAM6) and 2.0°C in CESM2(WACCM6). Thus, these two CESM2 model versions have higher values of ECS than the previous generation of model, the CESM (CAM5) (hereafter CESM1), that had an ECS of 4.1°C, though the CESM2 versions have lower values of TCR compared to the CESM1 with a somewhat higher value of 2.3°C. All model versions produce credible simulations of the time evolution of historical global surface temperature. The higher ECS values for the CESM2 versions are reflected in higher values of global surface temperature increase by 2,100 in CESM2(CAM6) and CESM2(WACCM6) compared to CESM1 between comparable emission scenarios for the high forcing scenario. Future warming among CESM2 model versions and scenarios diverges around 2050. The larger values of TCR and ECS in CESM2(CAM6) compared to CESM1 are manifested by greater warming in the tropics. Associated with a higher climate sensitivity, for CESM2(CAM6) the first instance of an ice‐free Arctic in September occurs for all scenarios and ensemble members in the 2030–2050 time frame, but about a decade later in CESM2(WACCM6), occurring around 2040–2060.
-
more » « less
Abstract In the tropics, the absorbed solar radiation is larger than the outgoing longwave radiation, while the opposite is true at high latitudes. This basic fact implies a poleward energy transport (PET) in both hemispheres, which is accomplished by the atmosphere and oceans. The magnitude of PET is determined by the top of atmosphere gradient in the net radiation flux, and small changes to this quantity must change the total PET in the absence of changes in heat uptake. We analyze a large ensemble of 50 historic climate simulations from the CESM LENS2 project and find a significant PET anomaly in the latter half of the twentieth century. The temporal evolution of this anomaly—with a rapid increase after 1950, a peak near 1975, and a rapid decrease in the 1990s—mirrors the historic trend of sulfur dioxide (SO2, a significant aerosol predecessor) emissions from Europe and North America. This anomaly also appears in an analysis of the PET calculated from ERA5 reanalyses and from the CESM2 Single Forcing Large Ensemble. Consistent with previous studies, we find that historic SO2emissions from Europe and North America brightened clouds, which reflected additional solar radiation back to space in the midlatitudes: this shortwave anomaly increased the meridional gradient in the net TOA radiation flux and induced an anomalous northward energy transport. Finally, our results suggest that cryosphere processes become an additional important factor in setting the PET anomaly during the first years of the twenty-first century by contributing to the difference in absorbed solar radiation between hemispheres alongside cloud radiative effects.
significance statement In this study, we analyze a large group of climate model simulations from 1850 to 2014 and find that this historical pollution changed the way that heat was transported from the tropics to Earth’s poles. We also find this change in heat transport when we analyzed an atmospheric reanalysis, which is a historical dataset that combines many meteorological observations into a best estimate of the past climate state. This extra reflection of sunlight from polluted clouds cooled the Northern Hemisphere, and we hypothesize that this cooling caused more heat transport out of the tropics. Last, we find that similar pollution emitted from China and India in more recent decades has not led to a change in Earth’s heat transport because of counteracting changes in snow and ice in the Northern Hemisphere.
