Fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Strong decline under continued warming and Greenland melting
Abstract
The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report concludes thatthe Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) could weaken substantially but is very unlikely tocollapse in the 21st century. However, the assessment largely neglected Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS)mass loss, lacked a comprehensive uncertainty analysis, and was limited to the 21st century. Here in acommunity effort, improved estimates of GrIS mass loss are included in multicentennial projections usingeight state-of-the-science climate models, and an AMOC emulator is used to provide a probabilisticuncertainty assessment. We find that GrIS melting affects AMOC projections, even though it is of secondaryimportance. By years 2090–2100, the AMOC weakens by 18% [3%, 34%; 90% probability] in an intermediategreenhouse-gas mitigation scenario and by 37% [15%, 65%] under continued high emissions. Afterward, itstabilizes in the former but continues to decline in the latter to 74% [+4%, 100%] by 2290–2300, with a 44%likelihood of an AMOC collapse. This result suggests that an AMOC collapse can be avoided by CO2mitigation.
- Authors:
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[1];
[1];
[2];
[3];
[2];
[3];
[5];
[6];
[4];
[7];
[8];
[9];
[4];
[6]
- Oregon State Univ., Corvallis, OR (United States). College or Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences
- Univ. of Utrecht (Netherlands). Inst. for Marine and Atmospheric research
- Univ. of Tokyo, Tokyo (Japan). Atmosphere and Ocean Research Inst.
- Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), Floreat Park, WA (Australia)
- National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO (United States)
- Univ. of Arizona, Tucson, AZ (United States). Dept. of Geosciences
- Sogn og Fjordane Univ. College, Sogndal (Norway). Faculty of Engineering and Science; Universidad de Magallanes, Punta Arenas (Chile). Antarctic and Sub-Antarctic Program
- Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis, Victoria, BC (Canada)
- Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace, Paris (France)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1461287
- Grant/Contract Number:
- FC02-97ER62402; NA15OAR4310239
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 43; Journal Issue: 23; Journal ID: ISSN 0094-8276
- Publisher:
- American Geophysical Union
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Citation Formats
Bakker, P., Schmittner, A., Lenaerts, J. T. M., Abe-Ouchi, A., Bi, D., van den Broeke, M. R., Chan, W. -L., Hu, A., Beadling, R. L., Marsland, S. J., Mernild, S. H., Saenko, O. A., Swingedouw, D., Sullivan, A., and Yin, J. Fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Strong decline under continued warming and Greenland melting. United States: N. p., 2016.
Web. doi:10.1002/2016GL070457.
Bakker, P., Schmittner, A., Lenaerts, J. T. M., Abe-Ouchi, A., Bi, D., van den Broeke, M. R., Chan, W. -L., Hu, A., Beadling, R. L., Marsland, S. J., Mernild, S. H., Saenko, O. A., Swingedouw, D., Sullivan, A., & Yin, J. Fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Strong decline under continued warming and Greenland melting. United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL070457
Bakker, P., Schmittner, A., Lenaerts, J. T. M., Abe-Ouchi, A., Bi, D., van den Broeke, M. R., Chan, W. -L., Hu, A., Beadling, R. L., Marsland, S. J., Mernild, S. H., Saenko, O. A., Swingedouw, D., Sullivan, A., and Yin, J. Tue .
"Fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Strong decline under continued warming and Greenland melting". United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GL070457. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1461287.
@article{osti_1461287,
title = {Fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation: Strong decline under continued warming and Greenland melting},
author = {Bakker, P. and Schmittner, A. and Lenaerts, J. T. M. and Abe-Ouchi, A. and Bi, D. and van den Broeke, M. R. and Chan, W. -L. and Hu, A. and Beadling, R. L. and Marsland, S. J. and Mernild, S. H. and Saenko, O. A. and Swingedouw, D. and Sullivan, A. and Yin, J.},
abstractNote = {The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report concludes thatthe Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) could weaken substantially but is very unlikely tocollapse in the 21st century. However, the assessment largely neglected Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS)mass loss, lacked a comprehensive uncertainty analysis, and was limited to the 21st century. Here in acommunity effort, improved estimates of GrIS mass loss are included in multicentennial projections usingeight state-of-the-science climate models, and an AMOC emulator is used to provide a probabilisticuncertainty assessment. We find that GrIS melting affects AMOC projections, even though it is of secondaryimportance. By years 2090–2100, the AMOC weakens by 18% [3%, 34%; 90% probability] in an intermediategreenhouse-gas mitigation scenario and by 37% [15%, 65%] under continued high emissions. Afterward, itstabilizes in the former but continues to decline in the latter to 74% [+4%, 100%] by 2290–2300, with a 44%likelihood of an AMOC collapse. This result suggests that an AMOC collapse can be avoided by CO2mitigation.},
doi = {10.1002/2016GL070457},
journal = {Geophysical Research Letters},
number = 23,
volume = 43,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Dec 13 00:00:00 EST 2016},
month = {Tue Dec 13 00:00:00 EST 2016}
}
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