The lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate
Abstract
Moist air is lighter than dry air at the same temperature, pressure, and volume because the molecular weight of water is less than that of dry air. We call this the vapor buoyancy effect. Although this effect is well documented, its impact on Earth’s climate has been overlooked. Here, we show that the lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate by increasing the outgoing longwave radiation (OLR). In the tropical atmosphere, buoyancy is horizontally uniform. Then, the vapor buoyancy in the moist regions must be balanced by warmer temperatures in the dry regions of the tropical atmosphere. These higher temperatures increase tropical OLR. This radiative effect increases with warming, leading to a negative climate feedback. At a near present-day surface temperature, vapor buoyancy is responsible for a radiative effect of 1 W/m2 and a negative climate feedback of about 0.15 W/m2 per kelvin.
- Authors:
-
[1];
[1]
- Univ. of California, Davis, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1631663
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC02-05CH11231
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Science Advances
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 6; Journal Issue: 19; Journal ID: ISSN 2375-2548
- Publisher:
- AAAS
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Citation Formats
Seidel, Seth D., and Yang, Da. The lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate. United States: N. p., 2020.
Web. doi:10.1126/sciadv.aba1951.
Seidel, Seth D., & Yang, Da. The lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate. United States. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aba1951
Seidel, Seth D., and Yang, Da. Wed .
"The lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate". United States. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aba1951. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1631663.
@article{osti_1631663,
title = {The lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate},
author = {Seidel, Seth D. and Yang, Da},
abstractNote = {Moist air is lighter than dry air at the same temperature, pressure, and volume because the molecular weight of water is less than that of dry air. We call this the vapor buoyancy effect. Although this effect is well documented, its impact on Earth’s climate has been overlooked. Here, we show that the lightness of water vapor helps to stabilize tropical climate by increasing the outgoing longwave radiation (OLR). In the tropical atmosphere, buoyancy is horizontally uniform. Then, the vapor buoyancy in the moist regions must be balanced by warmer temperatures in the dry regions of the tropical atmosphere. These higher temperatures increase tropical OLR. This radiative effect increases with warming, leading to a negative climate feedback. At a near present-day surface temperature, vapor buoyancy is responsible for a radiative effect of 1 W/m2 and a negative climate feedback of about 0.15 W/m2 per kelvin.},
doi = {10.1126/sciadv.aba1951},
journal = {Science Advances},
number = 19,
volume = 6,
place = {United States},
year = {Wed May 06 00:00:00 EDT 2020},
month = {Wed May 06 00:00:00 EDT 2020}
}
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