Identification

Title

A decomposition of feedback contributions to Polar warming amplification

Abstract

Polar surface temperatures are expected to warm 2–3 times faster than the global-mean surface temperature: a phenomenon referred to as polar warming amplification. Therefore, understanding the individual process contributions to the polar warming is critical to understanding global climate sensitivity. The Coupled Feedback Response Analysis Method (CFRAM) is applied to decompose the annual- and zonal-mean vertical temperature response within a transient 1% yr−1 CO2 increase simulation of the NCAR Community Climate System Model, version 4 (CCSM4), into individual radiative and nonradiative climate feedback process contributions. The total transient annual-mean polar warming amplification (amplification factor) at the time of CO2 doubling is +2.12 (2.3) and +0.94 K (1.6) in the Northern and Southern Hemisphere, respectively. Surface albedo feedback is the largest contributor to the annual-mean polar warming amplification accounting for +1.82 and +1.04 K in the Northern and Southern Hemisphere, respectively. Net cloud feedback is found to be the second largest contributor to polar warming amplification (about +0.38 K in both hemispheres) and is driven by the enhanced downward longwave radiation to the surface resulting from increases in low polar water cloud. The external forcing and atmospheric dynamic transport also contribute positively to polar warming amplification: +0.29 and +0.32 K, respectively. Water vapor feedback contributes negatively to polar warming amplification because its induced surface warming is stronger in low latitudes. Ocean heat transport storage and surface turbulent flux feedbacks also contribute negatively to polar warming amplification. Ocean heat transport and storage terms play an important role in reducing the warming over the Southern Ocean and Northern Atlantic Ocean.

Resource type

document

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http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7qf8tqh

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

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Classification of spatial data and services

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geoscientificInformation

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title

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reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

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East bounding longitude

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publication

effective date

2013-09-15T00:00:00Z

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Copyright 2013 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be "fair use" under Section 107 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law (17 USC, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the Society's permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form on servers, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statements, requires written permission or license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policies, available from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or amspubs@ametsoc.org. Permission to place a copy of this work on this server has been provided by the AMS. The AMS does not guarantee that the copy provided here is an accurate copy of the published work.

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None

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contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

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pointOfContact

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