Climate change

About: Climate change is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 99222 publications have been published within this topic receiving 3572006 citations.

ENSO and greenhouse warming

Abstract: This Review looks at the state of knowledge on the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a natural climate phenomenon. It discusses recent advances and insights into how climate change will affect this natural climate varibility cycle. The El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the dominant climate phenomenon affecting extreme weather conditions worldwide. Its response to greenhouse warming has challenged scientists for decades, despite model agreement on projected changes in mean state. Recent studies have provided new insights into the elusive links between changes in ENSO and in the mean state of the Pacific climate. The projected slow-down in Walker circulation is expected to weaken equatorial Pacific Ocean currents, boosting the occurrences of eastward-propagating warm surface anomalies that characterize observed extreme El Nino events. Accelerated equatorial Pacific warming, particularly in the east, is expected to induce extreme rainfall in the eastern equatorial Pacific and extreme equatorward swings of the Pacific convergence zones, both of which are features of extreme El Nino. The frequency of extreme La Nina is also expected to increase in response to more extreme El Ninos, an accelerated maritime continent warming and surface-intensified ocean warming. ENSO-related catastrophic weather events are thus likely to occur more frequently with unabated greenhouse-gas emissions. But model biases and recent observed strengthening of the Walker circulation highlight the need for further testing as new models, observations and insights become available.

Archaeological and palaeoecological indications of an abrupt climate change in The Netherlands, and evidence for climatological teleconnections around 2650 BP

Abstract: A sudden and sharp rise in the C-14 content of the atmosphere, which occurred between ca. 850 and 760 calendar yr BC (ca. 2750-2450 BP on the radiocarbon time-scale), was contemporaneous with an abrupt climate change. In northwest Europe (as indicated by palaeoecological and geological evidence) climate changed from relatively warm and continental to oceanic. As a consequence, the ground-water table rose considerably in certain low-lying areas in The Netherlands. Archaeological and palaeoecological evidence for the abandonment of such areas in the northern Netherlands is interpreted as the effect of a rise of the water table and the extension of fens and bogs. Contraction of population and finally migration from these low-lying areas, which had become marginal for occupation, and the earliest colonisation by farming communities of the newly emerged salt marshes in the northern Netherlands around 2550 BP, is interpreted as the consequence of loss of cultivated land. Thermic contraction of ocean water and/or decreased velocity and pressure on the coast by the Gulf Stream may have caused a fall in relative sea-level rise and the emergence of these salt marshes. Evidence for a synchronous climatic change elsewhere in Europe and on other continents around 2650 BP is presented. Temporary aridity in tropical regions and a reduced transport of warmth to the temperate climate regions by atmospheric and/or oceanic circulation systems could explain the observed changes. As yet there is no clear explanation for this climate change and the contemporaneous increase of C-14 in the atmosphere. The strategy of C-14 wiggle-match dating can play an important role in the precise dating of organic deposits, and can be used to establish possible relationships between changing C-14 production in the atmosphere, climate change, and the impact of such changes on hydrology, vegetation, and human communities.

Anthropogenic climate change for 1860 to 2100 simulated with the HadCM3 model under updated emissions scenarios

Abstract: In this study we examine the anthropogenically forced climate response over the historical period, 1860 to present, and projected response to 2100, using updated emissions scenarios and an improved coupled model (HadCM3) that does not use flux adjustments. We concentrate on four new Special Report on Emission Scenarios (SRES) namely (A1FI, A2, B2, B1) prepared for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Third Assessment Report, considered more self-consistent in their socio-economic and emissions structure, and therefore more policy relevant, than older scenarios like IS92a. We include an interactive model representation of the anthropogenic sulfur cycle and both direct and indirect forcings from sulfate aerosols, but omit the second indirect forcing effect through cloud lifetimes. The modelled first indirect forcing effect through cloud droplet size is near the centre of the IPCC uncertainty range. We also model variations in tropospheric and stratospheric ozone. Greenhouse gas-forced climate change response in B2 resembles patterns in IS92a but is smaller. Sulfate aerosol and ozone forcing substantially modulates the response, cooling the land, particularly northern mid-latitudes, and altering the monsoon structure. By 2100, global mean warming in SRES scenarios ranges from 2.6 to 5.3 K above 1900 and precipitation rises by 1%/K through the twenty first century (1.4%/K omitting aerosol changes). Large-scale patterns of response broadly resemble those in an earlier model (HadCM2), but with important regional differences, particularly in the tropics. Some divergence in future response occurs across scenarios for the regions considered, but marked drying in the mid-USA and southern Europe and significantly wetter conditions for South Asia, in June–July–August, are robust and significant.

Volcanic forcing of climate over the past 1500 years: An improved ice core-based index for climate models

Abstract: [1] Understanding natural causes of climate change is vital to evaluate the relative impacts of human pollution and land surface modification on climate. We have investigated one of the most important natural causes of climate change, volcanic eruptions, by using 54 ice core records from both the Arctic and Antarctica. Our recently collected suite of ice core data, more than double the number of cores ever used before, reduces errors inherent in reconstructions based on a single or small number of cores, which enables us to obtain much higher accuracy in both detection of events and quantification of the radiative effects. We extracted volcanic deposition signals from each ice core record by applying a high-pass loess filter to the time series and examining peaks that exceed twice the 31-year running median absolute deviation. We then studied the spatial pattern of volcanic sulfate deposition on Greenland and Antarctica and combined this knowledge with a new understanding of stratospheric transport of volcanic aerosols to produce a forcing data set as a function of month, latitude, and altitude for the past 1500 years. We estimated the uncertainties associated with the choice of volcanic signal extraction criteria, ice core sulfate deposition to stratospheric loading calibration factor, and the season for the eruptions without a recorded month. We forced an energy balance climate model with this new volcanic forcing data set, together with solar and anthropogenic forcing, to simulate the large-scale temperature response. The results agree well with instrumental observations for the past 150 years and with proxy records for the entire period. Through better characterization of the natural causes of climate change, this new data set will lead to improved prediction of anthropogenic impacts on climate. The new data set of stratospheric sulfate injections from volcanic eruptions for the past 1500 years, as a function of latitude, altitude, and month, is available for download in a format suitable for forcing general circulation models of the climate system.

Tropical Temperature Variations Since 20,000 Years Ago: Modulating Interhemispheric Climate Change

Abstract: Tropical sea surface temperatures (SSTs), as thermodynamically recorded in Barbados corals, were 5°C colder than present values 19,000 years ago. Variable tropical SSTs may explain the interhemispheric synchroneity of global climate change as recorded in ice cores, snowline reconstructions, and vegetation records. Radiative changes due to cloud type and cloud cover are plausible mechanisms for maintaining cooler tropical SSTs in the past.