Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations
We investigate the climate response to increased concentrations of black carbon (BC), as part of the Precipitation Driver Response Model Intercomparison Project (PDRMIP). A tenfold increase in BC is simulated by nine global coupled-climate models, producing a model median effective radiative forcing...
Published in: | Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres |
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Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/54948 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JD027326 |
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ftimperialcol:oai:spiral.imperial.ac.uk:10044/1/54948 2023-05-15T15:11:08+02:00 Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations Stjern, CW Samset, BH Myhre, G Forster, PM Hodnebrog, Ø Andrews, T Boucher, O Faluvegi, G Iversen, T Kasoar, M Kharin, V Kirkevåg, A Lamarque, J-F Olivié, D Richardson, T Shawki, D Shindell, D Smith, CJ Takemura, T Voulgarakis, A 2017-09-21 http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/54948 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JD027326 unknown American Geophysical Union Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres ©2017. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. CC-BY 481 462 Journal Article 2017 ftimperialcol https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JD027326 2018-09-16T06:01:13Z We investigate the climate response to increased concentrations of black carbon (BC), as part of the Precipitation Driver Response Model Intercomparison Project (PDRMIP). A tenfold increase in BC is simulated by nine global coupled-climate models, producing a model median effective radiative forcing of 0.82 (ranging from 0.41 to 2.91) W m−2, and a warming of 0.67 (0.16 to 1.66) K globally and 1.24 (0.26 to 4.31) K in the Arctic. A strong positive instantaneous radiative forcing (median of 2.10 W m−2 based on five of the models) is countered by negative rapid adjustments (−0.64 W m−2 for the same five models), which dampen the total surface temperature signal. Unlike other drivers of climate change, the response of temperature and cloud profiles to the BC forcing is dominated by rapid adjustments. Low-level cloud amounts increase for all models, while higher-level clouds are diminished. The rapid temperature response is particularly strong above 400 hPa, where increased atmospheric stabilization and reduced cloud cover contrast the response pattern of the other drivers. In conclusion, we find that this substantial increase in BC concentrations does have considerable impacts on important aspects of the climate system. However, some of these effects tend to offset one another, leaving a relatively small median global warming of 0.47 K per W m−2—about 20% lower than the response to a doubling of CO2. Translating the tenfold increase in BC to the present-day impact of anthropogenic BC (given the emissions used in this work) would leave a warming of merely 0.07 K. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic black carbon Climate change Global warming Imperial College London: Spiral Arctic Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 122 21 11,462 11,481 |
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Imperial College London: Spiral |
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ftimperialcol |
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description |
We investigate the climate response to increased concentrations of black carbon (BC), as part of the Precipitation Driver Response Model Intercomparison Project (PDRMIP). A tenfold increase in BC is simulated by nine global coupled-climate models, producing a model median effective radiative forcing of 0.82 (ranging from 0.41 to 2.91) W m−2, and a warming of 0.67 (0.16 to 1.66) K globally and 1.24 (0.26 to 4.31) K in the Arctic. A strong positive instantaneous radiative forcing (median of 2.10 W m−2 based on five of the models) is countered by negative rapid adjustments (−0.64 W m−2 for the same five models), which dampen the total surface temperature signal. Unlike other drivers of climate change, the response of temperature and cloud profiles to the BC forcing is dominated by rapid adjustments. Low-level cloud amounts increase for all models, while higher-level clouds are diminished. The rapid temperature response is particularly strong above 400 hPa, where increased atmospheric stabilization and reduced cloud cover contrast the response pattern of the other drivers. In conclusion, we find that this substantial increase in BC concentrations does have considerable impacts on important aspects of the climate system. However, some of these effects tend to offset one another, leaving a relatively small median global warming of 0.47 K per W m−2—about 20% lower than the response to a doubling of CO2. Translating the tenfold increase in BC to the present-day impact of anthropogenic BC (given the emissions used in this work) would leave a warming of merely 0.07 K. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Stjern, CW Samset, BH Myhre, G Forster, PM Hodnebrog, Ø Andrews, T Boucher, O Faluvegi, G Iversen, T Kasoar, M Kharin, V Kirkevåg, A Lamarque, J-F Olivié, D Richardson, T Shawki, D Shindell, D Smith, CJ Takemura, T Voulgarakis, A |
spellingShingle |
Stjern, CW Samset, BH Myhre, G Forster, PM Hodnebrog, Ø Andrews, T Boucher, O Faluvegi, G Iversen, T Kasoar, M Kharin, V Kirkevåg, A Lamarque, J-F Olivié, D Richardson, T Shawki, D Shindell, D Smith, CJ Takemura, T Voulgarakis, A Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
author_facet |
Stjern, CW Samset, BH Myhre, G Forster, PM Hodnebrog, Ø Andrews, T Boucher, O Faluvegi, G Iversen, T Kasoar, M Kharin, V Kirkevåg, A Lamarque, J-F Olivié, D Richardson, T Shawki, D Shindell, D Smith, CJ Takemura, T Voulgarakis, A |
author_sort |
Stjern, CW |
title |
Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
title_short |
Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
title_full |
Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
title_fullStr |
Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
title_full_unstemmed |
Rapid Adjustments Cause Weak Surface Temperature Response to Increased Black Carbon Concentrations |
title_sort |
rapid adjustments cause weak surface temperature response to increased black carbon concentrations |
publisher |
American Geophysical Union |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/54948 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JD027326 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic black carbon Climate change Global warming |
genre_facet |
Arctic black carbon Climate change Global warming |
op_source |
481 462 |
op_relation |
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres |
op_rights |
©2017. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JD027326 |
container_title |
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres |
container_volume |
122 |
container_issue |
21 |
container_start_page |
11,462 |
op_container_end_page |
11,481 |
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1766342032024928256 |