The effects of anthropogenic and volcanic aerosols and greenhouse gases on twentieth century Sahel precipitation

Herman, Rebecca Jean; Giannini, Alessandra; Biasutti, Michela; Kushnir, Yochanan

doi:10.1038/s41598-020-68356-w

The effects of anthropogenic and volcanic aerosols and greenhouse gases on twentieth century Sahel precipitation

Journal Article · Wed Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2020 · Scientific Reports

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-68356-w· OSTI ID:1641847

; ; ;

Abstract

There is little scientific consensus on the importance of external climate forcings—including anthropogenic aerosols, volcanic aerosols, and greenhouse gases (GHG)—relative to each other and to internal variability in dictating past and future Sahel rainfall. We address this query by relating a 3-tiered multi-model mean (MMM) over the Climate Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 “twentieth century” and pre-Industrial control simulations to observations. The comparison of single-forcing and historical simulations highlights the importance of anthropogenic and volcanic aerosols over GHG in generating forced Sahel rainfall variability in models. However, the forced MMM only accounts for a small fraction of observed variance. A residual consistency test shows that simulated internal variability cannot explain the residual observed multidecadal variability, and points to model deficiency in simulating multidecadal variability in the forced response, internal variability, or both.

View Journal Article

Research Organization:: Columbia Univ., New York, NY (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE; USDOE Office of Science (SC)

Grant/Contract Number:: SC0014423

OSTI ID:: 1641847

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1802641

Journal Information:: Scientific Reports, Journal Name: Scientific Reports Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 10; ISSN 2045-2322

Publisher:: Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United Kingdom

Language:: English

References (53)

Decreased monsoon precipitation in the Northern Hemisphere due to anthropogenic aerosols Polson, D.; Bollasina, M.; Hegerl, G. C. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 41, Issue 16 https://doi.org/10.1002/2014GL060811	journal	August 2014
Atmospheric responses to the redistribution of anthropogenic aerosols Wang, Yuan; Jiang, Jonathan H.; Su, Hui Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 120, Issue 18 https://doi.org/10.1002/2015JD023665	journal	September 2015
Understanding Pacific Ocean influence on interannual precipitation variability in the Sahel: PACIFIC OCEAN INFLUENCE ON SAHEL PRECIPITATION Pomposi, Catherine; Giannini, Alessandra; Kushnir, Yochanan Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 43, Issue 17 https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL069980	journal	September 2016
The global aerosol‐cloud first indirect effect estimated using MODIS, MERRA, and AeroCom McCoy, D. T.; Bender, F. A. ‐M.; Mohrmann, J. K. C. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 122, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1002/2016JD026141	journal	February 2017
On the persistence and coherence of subpolar sea surface temperature and salinity anomalies associated with the Atlantic multidecadal variability: Persistence and Coherence of SST and SSS Zhang, Rong Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 44, Issue 15 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL074342	journal	August 2017
Anthropogenic sulfate aerosol and the southward shift of tropical precipitation in the late 20th century: AEROSOLS AND TROPICAL RAIN BELT SHIFTS Hwang, Yen-Ting; Frierson, Dargan M. W.; Kang, Sarah M. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 40, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.1002/grl.50502	journal	June 2013
Forced Sahel rainfall trends in the CMIP5 archive: FORCED RAINFALL TRENDS IN THE SAHEL Biasutti, M. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 118, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1002/jgrd.50206	journal	February 2013
Updated high-resolution grids of monthly climatic observations - the CRU TS3.10 Dataset: UPDATED HIGH-RESOLUTION GRIDS OF MONTHLY CLIMATIC OBSERVATIONS Harris, I.; Jones, P. D.; Osborn, T. J. International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 34, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.3711	journal	May 2013
Dynamics of deserts and drought in the Sahel Charney, J. G. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, Vol. 101, Issue 428 https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.49710142802	journal	April 1975
Variability of summer rainfall over tropical north Africa (1906–92): Observations and modelling Rowell, David P.; Folland, Chris K.; Maskell, Kathy Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, Vol. 121, Issue 523 https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.49712152311	journal	April 1995
Use of models in detection and attribution of climate change: Models in detection and attribution of climate change Hegerl, Gabriele; Zwiers, Francis Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, Vol. 2, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.121	journal	May 2011
Moisture budget analysis of SST-driven decadal Sahel precipitation variability in the twentieth century Pomposi, Catherine; Kushnir, Yochanan; Giannini, Alessandra Climate Dynamics, Vol. 44, Issue 11-12 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-014-2382-3	journal	November 2014
The role of aerosols and greenhouse gases in Sahel drought and recovery Giannini, Alessandra; Kaplan, Alexey Climatic Change, Vol. 152, Issue 3-4 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-018-2341-9	journal	December 2018
Structural analysis of hypocentral distribution of an earthquake sequence using anisotropic wavelets: Method and application: STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF HYPOCENTRAL DISTRIBUTION Gaillot, P.; Darrozes, J.; Courjault-Radé, P. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, Vol. 107, Issue B10 https://doi.org/10.1029/2001JB000212	journal	October 2002
Sahel rainfall variability and response to greenhouse warming: SAHEL RAINFALL Haarsma, Reindert J.; Selten, Frank M.; Weber, Suzanne L. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, Issue 17 https://doi.org/10.1029/2005GL023232	journal	September 2005
Robust Sahel drying in response to late 20th century forcings Biasutti, Michela; Giannini, Alessandra Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 33, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.1029/2006GL026067	journal	January 2006
Detectable Impact of Local and Remote Anthropogenic Aerosols on the 20th Century Changes of West African and South Asian Monsoon Precipitation: D&A AEROSOLS AND MONSOON PRECIPITATION Undorf, S.; Polson, D.; Bollasina, M. A. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 123, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1029/2017JD027711	journal	May 2018
Underestimated AMOC Variability and Implications for AMV and Predictability in CMIP Models Yan, Xiaoqin; Zhang, Rong; Knutson, Thomas R. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 45, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL077378	journal	May 2018
Changes in Extreme Rainfall Over India and China Attributed to Regional Aerosol-Cloud Interaction During the Late 20th Century Rapid Industrialization Lin, Lei; Xu, Yangyang; Wang, Zhili Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 45, Issue 15 https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL078308	journal	August 2018
A Multivariate AMV Index and Associated Discrepancies Between Observed and CMIP5 Externally Forced AMV Yan, Xiaoqin; Zhang, Rong; Knutson, Thomas R. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 46, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL082787	journal	April 2019
Sahel rainfall and worldwide sea temperatures, 1901–85 Folland, C. K.; Palmer, T. N.; Parker, D. E. Nature, Vol. 320, Issue 6063 https://doi.org/10.1038/320602a0	journal	April 1986
Detection of human influence on twentieth-century precipitation trends Zhang, Xuebin; Zwiers, Francis W.; Hegerl, Gabriele C. Nature, Vol. 448, Issue 7152 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature06025	journal	July 2007
Untangling aerosol effects on clouds and precipitation in a buffered system Stevens, Bjorn; Feingold, Graham Nature, Vol. 461, Issue 7264 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature08281	journal	October 2009
Aerosols implicated as a prime driver of twentieth-century North Atlantic climate variability Booth, Ben B. B.; Dunstone, Nick J.; Halloran, Paul R. Nature, Vol. 484, Issue 7393 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature10946	journal	April 2012
Asymmetric forcing from stratospheric aerosols impacts Sahelian rainfall Haywood, Jim M.; Jones, Andy; Bellouin, Nicolas Nature Climate Change, Vol. 3, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1857	journal	March 2013
Dominant role of greenhouse-gas forcing in the recovery of Sahel rainfall Dong, Buwen; Sutton, Rowan Nature Climate Change, Vol. 5, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2664	journal	June 2015
Simulation of Sahel drought in the 20th and 21st centuries Held, I. M.; Delworth, T. L.; Lu, J. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 102, Issue 50 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0509057102	journal	December 2005
Combined effect of El Ni��o southern oscillation and Atlantic multidecadal oscillation on Lake Chad level variability Okonkwo, Churchill; Demoz, Belay; Sakai, Ricardo Cogent Geoscience, Vol. 1, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1080/23312041.2015.1117829	journal	December 2015
A unifying view of climate change in the Sahel linking intra-seasonal, interannual and longer time scales Giannini, A.; Salack, S.; Lodoun, T. Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 8, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024010	journal	April 2013
The global precipitation response to volcanic eruptions in the CMIP5 models Iles, Carley E.; Hegerl, Gabriele C. Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 9, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/9/10/104012	journal	October 2014
Storyline approach to the construction of regional climate change information Shepherd, Theodore G. Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 475, Issue 2225 https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.2019.0013	journal	May 2019
Oceanic Forcing of Sahel Rainfall on Interannual to Interdecadal Time Scales Giannini, A. Science, Vol. 302, Issue 5647 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1089357	journal	November 2003
Atlantic Ocean Forcing of North American and European Summer Climate Sutton, R. T. Science, Vol. 309, Issue 5731 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1109496	journal	July 2005
Comment on "The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation without a role for ocean circulation" Zhang, R.; Sutton, R.; Danabasoglu, G. Science, Vol. 352, Issue 6293 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aaf1660	journal	June 2016
The Volcanic Signal in Goddard Institute for Space Studies Three-Dimensional Model Simulations Robock, Alan; Liu, Yuhe Journal of Climate, Vol. 7, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(1994)007<0044:TVSIGI>2.0.CO;2	journal	January 1994
Tropical Rainfall Trends and the Indirect Aerosol Effect Rotstayn, Leon D.; Lohmann, Ulrike Journal of Climate, Vol. 15, Issue 15 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(2002)015<2103:TRTATI>2.0.CO;2	journal	August 2002
The Influence of Land Use Change on Climate in the Sahel Taylor, Christopher M.; Lambin, Eric F.; Stephenne, Nathalie Journal of Climate, Vol. 15, Issue 24 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(2002)015<3615:TIOLUC>2.0.CO;2	journal	December 2002
Solar and Greenhouse Gas Forcing and Climate Response in the Twentieth Century Meehl, Gerald A.; Washington, Warren M.; Wigley, T. M. L. Journal of Climate, Vol. 16, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(2003)016<0426:SAGGFA>2.0.CO;2	journal	February 2003
SST Forcings and Sahel Rainfall Variability in Simulations of the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries Biasutti, M.; Held, I. M.; Sobel, A. H. Journal of Climate, Vol. 21, Issue 14 https://doi.org/10.1175/2007JCLI1896.1	journal	July 2008
Forced and Internal Twentieth-Century SST Trends in the North Atlantic Ting, Mingfang; Kushnir, Yochanan; Seager, Richard Journal of Climate, Vol. 22, Issue 6 https://doi.org/10.1175/2008JCLI2561.1	journal	March 2009
Sulfate Aerosol Control of Tropical Atlantic Climate over the Twentieth Century Chang, C. -Y.; Chiang, J. C. H.; Wehner, M. F. Journal of Climate, Vol. 24, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1175/2010JCLI4065.1	journal	May 2011
THE WCRP CMIP3 Multimodel Dataset: A New Era in Climate Change Research Meehl, Gerald A.; Covey, Curt; Delworth, Thomas Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 88, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-88-9-1383	journal	September 2007
An Overview of CMIP5 and the Experiment Design Taylor, Karl E.; Stouffer, Ronald J.; Meehl, Gerald A. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 93, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-11-00094.1	journal	April 2012
Have Aerosols Caused the Observed Atlantic Multidecadal Variability? Zhang, Rong; Delworth, Thomas L.; Sutton, Rowan Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, Vol. 70, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1175/JAS-D-12-0331.1	journal	April 2013
Sensitivity of Twentieth-Century Sahel Rainfall to Sulfate Aerosol and CO ₂ Forcing Ackerley, Duncan; Booth, Ben B. B.; Knight, Sylvia H. E. Journal of Climate, Vol. 24, Issue 19 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00019.1	journal	October 2011
A Nonlinear Response of Sahel Rainfall to Atlantic Warming Neupane, Naresh; Cook, Kerry H. Journal of Climate, Vol. 26, Issue 18 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00475.1	journal	September 2013
The Multidecadal Atlantic SST—Sahel Rainfall Teleconnection in CMIP5 Simulations Martin, Elinor R.; Thorncroft, Chris; Booth, Ben B. B. Journal of Climate, Vol. 27, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00242.1	journal	January 2014
Resolving Contrasting Regional Rainfall Responses to El Niño over Tropical Africa Parhi, Pradipta; Giannini, Alessandra; Gentine, Pierre Journal of Climate, Vol. 29, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-15-0071.1	journal	February 2016
Detection and Attribution of Twentieth-Century Northern and Southern African Rainfall Change Hoerling, Martin; Hurrell, James; Eischeid, Jon Journal of Climate, Vol. 19, Issue 16 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI3842.1	journal	August 2006
Global indirect aerosol effects: a review Lohmann, U.; Feichter, J. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Vol. 5, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-5-715-2005	journal	January 2005
Model intercomparison of indirect aerosol effects Penner, J. E.; Quaas, J.; Storelvmo, T. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Vol. 6, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-6-3391-2006	journal	January 2006
A description of the global land-surface precipitation data products of the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre with sample applications including centennial (trend) analysis from 1901–present Becker, A.; Finger, P.; Meyer-Christoffer, A. Earth System Science Data, Vol. 5, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-5-71-2013	journal	January 2013
Overview of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) experimental design and organization Eyring, Veronika; Bony, Sandrine; Meehl, Gerald A. Geoscientific Model Development, Vol. 9, Issue 5 https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-1937-2016	journal	January 2016

Similar Records

An Externally Forced Decadal Rainfall Seesaw Pattern Over the Sahel and Southeast Amazon

Journal Article · Thu Jan 24 19:00:00 EST 2019 · Geophysical Research Letters · OSTI ID:1632999

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Science & Technology - Other Topics

The effects of anthropogenic and volcanic aerosols and greenhouse gases on twentieth century Sahel precipitation

Citation Formats

References (53)

Similar Records

Related Subjects