First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System
Abstract Due to an imbalance between incoming and outgoing radiation at the top of the atmosphere, excess heat has accumulated in Earth's climate system in recent decades, driving global warming and climatic changes. To date, it has not been quantified how much of this excess heat is used to me...
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2023
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ftsubggeo:oai:e-docs.geo-leo.de:11858/10935 2023-08-20T04:05:02+02:00 First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System Nitzbon, Jan Krinner, Gerhard Schneider von Deimling, Thomas Werner, Martin Langer, Moritz Nitzbon, Jan; Krinner, Gerhard; Schneider von Deimling, Thomas; Werner, Martin; Langer, Moritz; 2023-06-12 https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102053 http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/purl?gldocs-11858/10935 eng eng doi:10.1029/2022GL102053 http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/purl?gldocs-11858/10935 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. ddc:551.6 permafrost Earth’s energy imbalance essential climate variable heat sink CryoGrid land surface model doc-type:article 2023 ftsubggeo https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102053 2023-07-30T22:12:30Z Abstract Due to an imbalance between incoming and outgoing radiation at the top of the atmosphere, excess heat has accumulated in Earth's climate system in recent decades, driving global warming and climatic changes. To date, it has not been quantified how much of this excess heat is used to melt ground ice in permafrost. Here, we diagnose changes in sensible and latent ground heat contents in the northern terrestrial permafrost region from ensemble‐simulations of a tailored land surface model. We find that between 1980 and 2018, about <mml:semantics> 3.9 + 1.4 − 1.6 <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex"> $3.9\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{+1.4}{-1.6}$</mml:annotation></mml:semantics> ZJ of heat, of which <mml:semantics> 1.7 + 1.3 − 1.4 <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex"> $1.7\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{+1.3}{-1.4}$</mml:annotation></mml:semantics> ZJ (44%) were used to melt ground ice, were absorbed by permafrost. Our estimate, which does not yet account for the potentially increased heat uptake due to thermokarst processes in ice‐rich terrain, suggests that permafrost is a persistent heat sink comparable in magnitude to other components of the cryosphere and must be explicitly considered when assessing Earth's energy imbalance. Plain Language Summary: In recent decades, planet Earth has received more energy from the sun than it has radiated back into space. This has led to an excess of energy that is causing global warming and climate change. While most of this excess energy is absorbed by Earth's oceans, some of it is used to melt ice in perennially frozen ground called permafrost. However, we do not know how much. In this study, we use a computer model to calculate how much energy the permafrost in the Arctic has absorbed over the past four decades. We find that permafrost has absorbed about 3.9 sextillion Joules of energy between 1980 and 2018. About 44% of this energy was used to melt ice contained in the ground, while the remaining energy was used to warm ... Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Climate change Global warming Ice permafrost Thermokarst GEO-LEOe-docs (FID GEO) Arctic Geophysical Research Letters 50 12 |
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GEO-LEOe-docs (FID GEO) |
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ftsubggeo |
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English |
topic |
ddc:551.6 permafrost Earth’s energy imbalance essential climate variable heat sink CryoGrid land surface model |
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ddc:551.6 permafrost Earth’s energy imbalance essential climate variable heat sink CryoGrid land surface model Nitzbon, Jan Krinner, Gerhard Schneider von Deimling, Thomas Werner, Martin Langer, Moritz Nitzbon, Jan; Krinner, Gerhard; Schneider von Deimling, Thomas; Werner, Martin; Langer, Moritz; First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
topic_facet |
ddc:551.6 permafrost Earth’s energy imbalance essential climate variable heat sink CryoGrid land surface model |
description |
Abstract Due to an imbalance between incoming and outgoing radiation at the top of the atmosphere, excess heat has accumulated in Earth's climate system in recent decades, driving global warming and climatic changes. To date, it has not been quantified how much of this excess heat is used to melt ground ice in permafrost. Here, we diagnose changes in sensible and latent ground heat contents in the northern terrestrial permafrost region from ensemble‐simulations of a tailored land surface model. We find that between 1980 and 2018, about <mml:semantics> 3.9 + 1.4 − 1.6 <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex"> $3.9\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{+1.4}{-1.6}$</mml:annotation></mml:semantics> ZJ of heat, of which <mml:semantics> 1.7 + 1.3 − 1.4 <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex"> $1.7\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{+1.3}{-1.4}$</mml:annotation></mml:semantics> ZJ (44%) were used to melt ground ice, were absorbed by permafrost. Our estimate, which does not yet account for the potentially increased heat uptake due to thermokarst processes in ice‐rich terrain, suggests that permafrost is a persistent heat sink comparable in magnitude to other components of the cryosphere and must be explicitly considered when assessing Earth's energy imbalance. Plain Language Summary: In recent decades, planet Earth has received more energy from the sun than it has radiated back into space. This has led to an excess of energy that is causing global warming and climate change. While most of this excess energy is absorbed by Earth's oceans, some of it is used to melt ice in perennially frozen ground called permafrost. However, we do not know how much. In this study, we use a computer model to calculate how much energy the permafrost in the Arctic has absorbed over the past four decades. We find that permafrost has absorbed about 3.9 sextillion Joules of energy between 1980 and 2018. About 44% of this energy was used to melt ice contained in the ground, while the remaining energy was used to warm ... |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Nitzbon, Jan Krinner, Gerhard Schneider von Deimling, Thomas Werner, Martin Langer, Moritz Nitzbon, Jan; Krinner, Gerhard; Schneider von Deimling, Thomas; Werner, Martin; Langer, Moritz; |
author_facet |
Nitzbon, Jan Krinner, Gerhard Schneider von Deimling, Thomas Werner, Martin Langer, Moritz Nitzbon, Jan; Krinner, Gerhard; Schneider von Deimling, Thomas; Werner, Martin; Langer, Moritz; |
author_sort |
Nitzbon, Jan |
title |
First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
title_short |
First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
title_full |
First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
title_fullStr |
First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
title_full_unstemmed |
First Quantification of the Permafrost Heat Sink in the Earth's Climate System |
title_sort |
first quantification of the permafrost heat sink in the earth's climate system |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102053 http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/purl?gldocs-11858/10935 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Climate change Global warming Ice permafrost Thermokarst |
genre_facet |
Arctic Climate change Global warming Ice permafrost Thermokarst |
op_relation |
doi:10.1029/2022GL102053 http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/purl?gldocs-11858/10935 |
op_rights |
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_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102053 |
container_title |
Geophysical Research Letters |
container_volume |
50 |
container_issue |
12 |
_version_ |
1774715450830094336 |