Enhanced upper ocean warming projected by the eddy-resolving Community Earth System Model

Ocean warming is a key factor impacting future changes in climate. Here we investigate vertical structure changes in globally averaged ocean heat content (OHC) in high- (HR) and low-resolution (LR) future climate simulations with the Community Earth System Model (CESM). Compared with observation-based estimates, the simulated OHC anomalies in the upper 700 and 2,000 m during 1960-2020 are more realistic in CESM-HR than -LR. Under RCP8.5 scenario, the net surface heat into the ocean is very similar in CESM-HR and -LR. However, CESM-HR has a larger increase in OHC in the upper 250 m compared to CESM-LR, but a smaller increase below 250 m. This difference can be traced to differences in eddy-induced vertical heat transport between CESM-HR and -LR in the historical period. Moreover, our results suggest that with the same heat input, upper-ocean warming is likely to be underestimated by most non-eddy-resolving climate models.

To Access Resource:

Questions? Email Resource Support Contact:

  • opensky@ucar.edu
    UCAR/NCAR - Library

Resource Type publication
Temporal Range Begin N/A
Temporal Range End N/A
Temporal Resolution N/A
Bounding Box North Lat N/A
Bounding Box South Lat N/A
Bounding Box West Long N/A
Bounding Box East Long N/A
Spatial Representation N/A
Spatial Resolution N/A
Related Links N/A
Additional Information N/A
Resource Format PDF
Standardized Resource Format PDF
Asset Size N/A
Legal Constraints

Copyright author(s). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Access Constraints None
Software Implementation Language N/A

Resource Support Name N/A
Resource Support Email opensky@ucar.edu
Resource Support Organization UCAR/NCAR - Library
Distributor N/A
Metadata Contact Name N/A
Metadata Contact Email opensky@ucar.edu
Metadata Contact Organization UCAR/NCAR - Library

Author Xu, G.
Chang, P.
Small, R. Justin
Danabasoglu, Gokhan
Yeager, Stephen
Ramachandran, S.
Zhang, Q.
Publisher UCAR/NCAR - Library
Publication Date 2023-11-16T00:00:00
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) Not Assigned
Alternate Identifier N/A
Resource Version N/A
Topic Category geoscientificInformation
Progress N/A
Metadata Date 2025-07-11T15:12:43.722307
Metadata Record Identifier edu.ucar.opensky::articles:26725
Metadata Language eng; USA
Suggested Citation Xu, G., Chang, P., Small, R. Justin, Danabasoglu, Gokhan, Yeager, Stephen, Ramachandran, S., Zhang, Q.. (2023). Enhanced upper ocean warming projected by the eddy-resolving Community Earth System Model. UCAR/NCAR - Library. https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7vt1x5z. Accessed 22 August 2025.

Harvest Source