Atmospheric responses to Arctic sea ice loss in a high-top atmospheric general circulation model

• Main Authors: Liang, Yu Chiao, Kwon, Young‐Oh, Frankignoul, Claude, Danabasoglu, Gokhan, Yeager, Stephen G.
• Other Authors: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), Océan et variabilité du climat (VARCLIM), Laboratoire d'Océanographie et du Climat : Expérimentations et Approches Numériques (LOCEAN), Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle (MNHN)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut Pierre-Simon-Laplace (IPSL (FR_636)), École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-École polytechnique (X)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Paris Cité (UPCité)-École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-École polytechnique (X)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Paris Cité (UPCité)-Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle (MNHN)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut Pierre-Simon-Laplace (IPSL (FR_636)), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-École polytechnique (X)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Paris Cité (UPCité), National Center for Atmospheric Research Boulder (NCAR), AGU
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2018
• Subjects: 3305 Climate change and variability; ATMOSPHERIC PROCESSESDE: 3337 Global climate models; ATMOSPHERIC PROCESSESDE: 3362 Stratosphere/troposphere interactions; ATMOSPHERIC PROCESSESDE: 0750 Sea ice; CRYOSPHERE; [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-GEO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Geophysics [physics.geo-ph]; Arctic; Climate change; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-02391995

International audience Rapid Arctic warming and sea ice decline in recent decades might have profound impacts on midlatitude weather and climate. This study uses a high-top atmospheric general circulation model - Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model version 6 (WACCM6) - to investigate the atmospheric responses to the Arctic sea ice reduction, including impacts on mid-latitude blocking and cyclones. The high-top configuration (top layer at about 100 km or 0.001 hPa) together with the finer vertical resolution (70 layers) in WACCM6 allow more realistic representation of stratosphere-troposphere interactions. The sea ice impact during 1979-2015 is obtained by comparing ensemble simulations forced by daily observational sea ice concentration (SIC) and sea surface temperature (SST) to simulations where the time-varying SIC is replaced by a daily SIC climatology. A series of SIC-SST adjustments are performed to minimize unrealistic SIC and SST forcings used in the simulations. Each ensemble consists of 30 members with slightly different atmospheric initial conditions in order to separate forced atmospheric responses from internal model spread.