CMIP5 Climate Models Overestimate Cooling by Volcanic Aerosols
Abstract
We compare projections of the observed hemispherical mean surface temperature (HadCRUT4.6.0.0) and the ensemble mean of CMIP5 climate models' simulations on a set of standard regression model forcing variables. We find that the volcanic aerosol regression coefficients of the CMIP5 simulations are consistently significantly larger (by 40–49%) than the volcanic aerosol coefficients of the observed temperature. The probability that the observed differences are caused just by chance is much less than 0.01. The overestimate is due to the climate models' response to volcanic aerosol radiative forcing. The largest overestimate occurs in the winter season of each hemisphere. We hypothesize that the models' parameterization of aerosol-cloud interactions within ice and mixed phase clouds is a likely source of this discrepancy. Furthermore, the models significantly underestimate the effect of solar variability on temperature for both hemispheres.
- Authors:
-
[1];
[1]
- Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Univ. of East Anglia, Norwich (United Kingdom); Univ. of Gothenburg (Sweden); Univ. of Queensland, Toowoomba, QLD (Australia)
- PAR Associates, Las Cruces, NM (United States)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1601423
- Alternate Identifier(s):
- OSTI ID: 1596907
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-19-32146
Journal ID: ISSN 0094-8276
- Grant/Contract Number:
- 89233218C; NA000001
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 47; Journal Issue: 3; Journal ID: ISSN 0094-8276
- Publisher:
- American Geophysical Union
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; Earth Sciences; Climate models, volcanic aerosols; regression analysis; AMO; predictors radiative forcing
Citation Formats
Chylek, Petr, Folland, Chris, Klett, James D., and Dubey, Manvendra K. CMIP5 Climate Models Overestimate Cooling by Volcanic Aerosols. United States: N. p., 2020.
Web. doi:10.1029/2020GL087047.
Chylek, Petr, Folland, Chris, Klett, James D., & Dubey, Manvendra K. CMIP5 Climate Models Overestimate Cooling by Volcanic Aerosols. United States. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL087047
Chylek, Petr, Folland, Chris, Klett, James D., and Dubey, Manvendra K. Mon .
"CMIP5 Climate Models Overestimate Cooling by Volcanic Aerosols". United States. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL087047. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1601423.
@article{osti_1601423,
title = {CMIP5 Climate Models Overestimate Cooling by Volcanic Aerosols},
author = {Chylek, Petr and Folland, Chris and Klett, James D. and Dubey, Manvendra K.},
abstractNote = {We compare projections of the observed hemispherical mean surface temperature (HadCRUT4.6.0.0) and the ensemble mean of CMIP5 climate models' simulations on a set of standard regression model forcing variables. We find that the volcanic aerosol regression coefficients of the CMIP5 simulations are consistently significantly larger (by 40–49%) than the volcanic aerosol coefficients of the observed temperature. The probability that the observed differences are caused just by chance is much less than 0.01. The overestimate is due to the climate models' response to volcanic aerosol radiative forcing. The largest overestimate occurs in the winter season of each hemisphere. We hypothesize that the models' parameterization of aerosol-cloud interactions within ice and mixed phase clouds is a likely source of this discrepancy. Furthermore, the models significantly underestimate the effect of solar variability on temperature for both hemispheres.},
doi = {10.1029/2020GL087047},
journal = {Geophysical Research Letters},
number = 3,
volume = 47,
place = {United States},
year = {2020},
month = {2}
}
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