On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification
The mid-Pliocene (~3 to 3.3Ma ago), is a period of sustained global warmth in comparison to the late Quaternary (0 to ~1Ma ago), and has potential to inform predictions of long-term future climate change. However, given that several processes potentially contributed, relatively little is understood...
Published in: | Earth and Planetary Science Letters |
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2012
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Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1983/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84856446764&partnerID=8YFLogxK |
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ftubristolcris:oai:research-information.bris.ac.uk:publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 2024-04-28T08:24:58+00:00 On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification Lunt, Daniel J. Haywood, Alan M. Schmidt, Gavin A. Salzmann, Ulrich Valdes, Paul J. Dowsett, Harry J. Loptson, Claire A. 2012-03-01 https://hdl.handle.net/1983/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84856446764&partnerID=8YFLogxK eng eng https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess Lunt , D J , Haywood , A M , Schmidt , G A , Salzmann , U , Valdes , P J , Dowsett , H J & Loptson , C A 2012 , ' On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification ' , Earth and Planetary Science Letters , vol. 321-322 , pp. 128-138 . https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 Mid-Pliocene Paleoclimate modelling Polar amplification article 2012 ftubristolcris https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 2024-04-03T15:11:37Z The mid-Pliocene (~3 to 3.3Ma ago), is a period of sustained global warmth in comparison to the late Quaternary (0 to ~1Ma ago), and has potential to inform predictions of long-term future climate change. However, given that several processes potentially contributed, relatively little is understood about the reasons for the observed warmth, or the associated polar amplification. Here, using a modelling approach and a novel factorisation method, we assess the relative contributions to mid-Pliocene warmth from: elevated CO 2 , lowered orography, and vegetation and ice sheet changes. The results show that on a global scale, the largest contributor to mid-Pliocene warmth is elevated CO 2 . However, in terms of polar amplification, changes to ice sheets contribute significantly in the Southern Hemisphere, and orographic changes contribute significantly in the Northern Hemisphere. We also carry out an energy balance analysis which indicates that that on a global scale, surface albedo and atmospheric emmissivity changes dominate over cloud changes. We investigate the sensitivity of our results to uncertainties in the prescribed CO 2 and orographic changes, to derive uncertainty ranges for the various contributing processes. © 2012 Elsevier B.V. Article in Journal/Newspaper Ice Sheet University of Bristol: Bristol Research Earth and Planetary Science Letters 321-322 128 138 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Bristol: Bristol Research |
op_collection_id |
ftubristolcris |
language |
English |
topic |
Mid-Pliocene Paleoclimate modelling Polar amplification |
spellingShingle |
Mid-Pliocene Paleoclimate modelling Polar amplification Lunt, Daniel J. Haywood, Alan M. Schmidt, Gavin A. Salzmann, Ulrich Valdes, Paul J. Dowsett, Harry J. Loptson, Claire A. On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
topic_facet |
Mid-Pliocene Paleoclimate modelling Polar amplification |
description |
The mid-Pliocene (~3 to 3.3Ma ago), is a period of sustained global warmth in comparison to the late Quaternary (0 to ~1Ma ago), and has potential to inform predictions of long-term future climate change. However, given that several processes potentially contributed, relatively little is understood about the reasons for the observed warmth, or the associated polar amplification. Here, using a modelling approach and a novel factorisation method, we assess the relative contributions to mid-Pliocene warmth from: elevated CO 2 , lowered orography, and vegetation and ice sheet changes. The results show that on a global scale, the largest contributor to mid-Pliocene warmth is elevated CO 2 . However, in terms of polar amplification, changes to ice sheets contribute significantly in the Southern Hemisphere, and orographic changes contribute significantly in the Northern Hemisphere. We also carry out an energy balance analysis which indicates that that on a global scale, surface albedo and atmospheric emmissivity changes dominate over cloud changes. We investigate the sensitivity of our results to uncertainties in the prescribed CO 2 and orographic changes, to derive uncertainty ranges for the various contributing processes. © 2012 Elsevier B.V. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Lunt, Daniel J. Haywood, Alan M. Schmidt, Gavin A. Salzmann, Ulrich Valdes, Paul J. Dowsett, Harry J. Loptson, Claire A. |
author_facet |
Lunt, Daniel J. Haywood, Alan M. Schmidt, Gavin A. Salzmann, Ulrich Valdes, Paul J. Dowsett, Harry J. Loptson, Claire A. |
author_sort |
Lunt, Daniel J. |
title |
On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
title_short |
On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
title_full |
On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
title_fullStr |
On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
title_full_unstemmed |
On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
title_sort |
on the causes of mid-pliocene warmth and polar amplification |
publishDate |
2012 |
url |
https://hdl.handle.net/1983/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84856446764&partnerID=8YFLogxK |
genre |
Ice Sheet |
genre_facet |
Ice Sheet |
op_source |
Lunt , D J , Haywood , A M , Schmidt , G A , Salzmann , U , Valdes , P J , Dowsett , H J & Loptson , C A 2012 , ' On the causes of mid-Pliocene warmth and polar amplification ' , Earth and Planetary Science Letters , vol. 321-322 , pp. 128-138 . https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 |
op_relation |
https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/ce45e693-2f3e-4715-b886-77c691b60189 |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/restrictedAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.12.042 |
container_title |
Earth and Planetary Science Letters |
container_volume |
321-322 |
container_start_page |
128 |
op_container_end_page |
138 |
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1797584952870567936 |