Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter
Greenhouse gas (GHG) additions to Earth's atmosphere initially reduce global outgoing longwave radiation, thereby warming the planet. In select environments with temperature inversions, however, increased GHG concentrations can actually increase local outgoing longwave radiation. Negative top o...
Published in: | Geophysical Research Letters |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , , |
Language: | unknown |
Published: |
2023
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1537312 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1537312 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 |
id |
ftosti:oai:osti.gov:1537312 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftosti:oai:osti.gov:1537312 2023-07-30T03:57:37+02:00 Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter Flanner, M. G. Huang, X. Chen, X. Krinner, G. 2023-02-23 application/pdf http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1537312 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1537312 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 unknown http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1537312 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1537312 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 doi:10.1002/2017gl076668 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES 2023 ftosti https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 2023-07-11T09:34:54Z Greenhouse gas (GHG) additions to Earth's atmosphere initially reduce global outgoing longwave radiation, thereby warming the planet. In select environments with temperature inversions, however, increased GHG concentrations can actually increase local outgoing longwave radiation. Negative top of atmosphere and effective radiative forcing (ERF) from this situation give the impression that local surface temperatures could cool in response to GHG increases. Here we consider an extreme scenario in which GHG concentrations are increased only within the warmest layers of winter near-surface inversions of the Arctic and Antarctic. We find, using a fully coupled Earth system model, that the underlying surface warms despite the GHG addition exerting negative ERF and cooling the troposphere in the vicinity of the GHG increase. This unique radiative forcing and thermal response is facilitated by the high stability of the polar winter atmosphere, which inhibit thermal mixing and amplify the impact of surface radiative forcing on surface temperature. These findings also suggest that strategies to exploit negative ERF via injections of short-lived GHGs into inversion layers would likely be unsuccessful in cooling the planetary surface. Other/Unknown Material Antarc* Antarctic Arctic SciTec Connect (Office of Scientific and Technical Information - OSTI, U.S. Department of Energy) Arctic Antarctic Geophysical Research Letters 45 4 1997 2004 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
SciTec Connect (Office of Scientific and Technical Information - OSTI, U.S. Department of Energy) |
op_collection_id |
ftosti |
language |
unknown |
topic |
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
spellingShingle |
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES Flanner, M. G. Huang, X. Chen, X. Krinner, G. Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
topic_facet |
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
description |
Greenhouse gas (GHG) additions to Earth's atmosphere initially reduce global outgoing longwave radiation, thereby warming the planet. In select environments with temperature inversions, however, increased GHG concentrations can actually increase local outgoing longwave radiation. Negative top of atmosphere and effective radiative forcing (ERF) from this situation give the impression that local surface temperatures could cool in response to GHG increases. Here we consider an extreme scenario in which GHG concentrations are increased only within the warmest layers of winter near-surface inversions of the Arctic and Antarctic. We find, using a fully coupled Earth system model, that the underlying surface warms despite the GHG addition exerting negative ERF and cooling the troposphere in the vicinity of the GHG increase. This unique radiative forcing and thermal response is facilitated by the high stability of the polar winter atmosphere, which inhibit thermal mixing and amplify the impact of surface radiative forcing on surface temperature. These findings also suggest that strategies to exploit negative ERF via injections of short-lived GHGs into inversion layers would likely be unsuccessful in cooling the planetary surface. |
author |
Flanner, M. G. Huang, X. Chen, X. Krinner, G. |
author_facet |
Flanner, M. G. Huang, X. Chen, X. Krinner, G. |
author_sort |
Flanner, M. G. |
title |
Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
title_short |
Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
title_full |
Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
title_fullStr |
Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
title_full_unstemmed |
Climate Response to Negative Greenhouse Gas Radiative Forcing in Polar Winter |
title_sort |
climate response to negative greenhouse gas radiative forcing in polar winter |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1537312 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1537312 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 |
geographic |
Arctic Antarctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Antarctic |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Arctic |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Arctic |
op_relation |
http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1537312 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1537312 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 doi:10.1002/2017gl076668 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl076668 |
container_title |
Geophysical Research Letters |
container_volume |
45 |
container_issue |
4 |
container_start_page |
1997 |
op_container_end_page |
2004 |
_version_ |
1772818336228311040 |