Global and regional temperature-change potentials for near-term climate forcers

• Main Authors: Collins, W. J., Fry, M. M., Yu, H., Fuglestvedt, J. S., Shindell, D. T., West, J. J.
• Other Authors: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: AIR POLLUTION; RADIATIVE FORCING; NITROGEN OXIDES; TEMPERATE REGIONS; NORTHERN HEMISPHERE; AEROSOLS; OZONE; GLOBAL WARMING; METHANE; EUROPE; CLIMATOLOGY; NORTH AMERICA; ASIA; VOLATILE ORGANIC COMPOUNDS; CLIMATE; Arctic; black carbon; Global warming
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.17615/7891-x834; https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/downloads/cn69md33p?file=thumbnail; https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/downloads/cn69md33p

The emissions of reactive gases and aerosols can affect climate through the burdens of ozone, methane and aerosols, having both cooling and warming effects. These species are generally referred to near-term climate forcers (NTCFs) or short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs), because of their short atmospheric residence time. The mitigation of these would be attractive for both air quality and climate on a 30-year timescale, provided it is not at the expense of CO2 mitigation. In this study we examine the climate effects of the emissions of NTCFs from 4 continental regions (East Asia, Europe, North America and South Asia) using results from the Task Force on Hemispheric Transport of Air Pollution Source-Receptor global chemical transport model simulations. We address 3 aerosol species (sulphate, particulate organic matter and black carbon - BC) and 4 ozone precursors (methane, reactive nitrogen oxides - NOx, volatile organic compounds VOC, and carbon monoxide - CO). For the aerosols the global warming potentials (GWPs) and global temperature change potentials (GTPs) are simply time-dependent scaling of the equilibrium radiative forcing, with the GTPs decreasing more rapidly with time than the GWPs. While the aerosol climate metrics have only a modest dependence on emission region, emissions of NOx and VOCs from South Asia have GWPs and GTPs of higher magnitude than from the other northern hemisphere regions. On regional basis, the northern mid-latitude temperature response to northern mid-latitude emissions is approximately twice as large as the global average response for aerosol emission, and about 20-30% larger than the global average for methane, VOC and CO emissions. We also found that temperatures in the Arctic latitudes appear to be particularly sensitive to black carbon emissions from South Asia.