Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice.
The decline of Arctic sea ice has been documented in over 30 y of satellite passive microwave observations. The resulting darkening of the Arctic and its amplification of global warming was hypothesized almost 50 y ago but has yet to be verified with direct observations. This study uses satellite ra...
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ftcdlib:oai:escholarship.org/ark:/13030/qt6k14n7tm 2023-05-15T13:10:21+02:00 Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. Pistone, Kristina Eisenman, Ian Ramanathan, V 3322 - 3326 2014-03-01 application/pdf https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k14n7tm unknown eScholarship, University of California qt6k14n7tm https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k14n7tm public Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol 111, iss 9 Sunlight Seasons Ice Cover Arctic Regions Climate Change Satellite Imagery article 2014 ftcdlib 2020-11-20T15:17:39Z The decline of Arctic sea ice has been documented in over 30 y of satellite passive microwave observations. The resulting darkening of the Arctic and its amplification of global warming was hypothesized almost 50 y ago but has yet to be verified with direct observations. This study uses satellite radiation budget measurements along with satellite microwave sea ice data to document the Arctic-wide decrease in planetary albedo and its amplifying effect on the warming. The analysis reveals a striking relationship between planetary albedo and sea ice cover, quantities inferred from two independent satellite instruments. We find that the Arctic planetary albedo has decreased from 0.52 to 0.48 between 1979 and 2011, corresponding to an additional 6.4 ± 0.9 W/m(2) of solar energy input into the Arctic Ocean region since 1979. Averaged over the globe, this albedo decrease corresponds to a forcing that is 25% as large as that due to the change in CO2 during this period, considerably larger than expectations from models and other less direct recent estimates. Changes in cloudiness appear to play a negligible role in observed Arctic darkening, thus reducing the possibility of Arctic cloud albedo feedbacks mitigating future Arctic warming. Article in Journal/Newspaper albedo Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Global warming Sea ice University of California: eScholarship Arctic Arctic Ocean |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of California: eScholarship |
op_collection_id |
ftcdlib |
language |
unknown |
topic |
Sunlight Seasons Ice Cover Arctic Regions Climate Change Satellite Imagery |
spellingShingle |
Sunlight Seasons Ice Cover Arctic Regions Climate Change Satellite Imagery Pistone, Kristina Eisenman, Ian Ramanathan, V Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
topic_facet |
Sunlight Seasons Ice Cover Arctic Regions Climate Change Satellite Imagery |
description |
The decline of Arctic sea ice has been documented in over 30 y of satellite passive microwave observations. The resulting darkening of the Arctic and its amplification of global warming was hypothesized almost 50 y ago but has yet to be verified with direct observations. This study uses satellite radiation budget measurements along with satellite microwave sea ice data to document the Arctic-wide decrease in planetary albedo and its amplifying effect on the warming. The analysis reveals a striking relationship between planetary albedo and sea ice cover, quantities inferred from two independent satellite instruments. We find that the Arctic planetary albedo has decreased from 0.52 to 0.48 between 1979 and 2011, corresponding to an additional 6.4 ± 0.9 W/m(2) of solar energy input into the Arctic Ocean region since 1979. Averaged over the globe, this albedo decrease corresponds to a forcing that is 25% as large as that due to the change in CO2 during this period, considerably larger than expectations from models and other less direct recent estimates. Changes in cloudiness appear to play a negligible role in observed Arctic darkening, thus reducing the possibility of Arctic cloud albedo feedbacks mitigating future Arctic warming. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Pistone, Kristina Eisenman, Ian Ramanathan, V |
author_facet |
Pistone, Kristina Eisenman, Ian Ramanathan, V |
author_sort |
Pistone, Kristina |
title |
Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
title_short |
Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
title_full |
Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
title_fullStr |
Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing Arctic sea ice. |
title_sort |
observational determination of albedo decrease caused by vanishing arctic sea ice. |
publisher |
eScholarship, University of California |
publishDate |
2014 |
url |
https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k14n7tm |
op_coverage |
3322 - 3326 |
geographic |
Arctic Arctic Ocean |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Arctic Ocean |
genre |
albedo Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Global warming Sea ice |
genre_facet |
albedo Arctic Arctic Ocean Climate change Global warming Sea ice |
op_source |
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol 111, iss 9 |
op_relation |
qt6k14n7tm https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k14n7tm |
op_rights |
public |
_version_ |
1766226675510542336 |