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Desert dust aerosols affect Earth's global energy balance through directinteractions with radiation, and through indirect interactions with clouds andecosystems. But the magnitudes of these effects are so uncertain that itremains unclear whether atmospheric dust has a net warming or cooling effect onglobal climate. Consequently, it is still uncertain whether large changes inatmospheric dust loading over the past century have slowed or acceleratedanthropogenic climate change, or what the effects of potential future changesin dust loading will be. Here we present an analysis of the size and abundanceof dust aerosols to constrain the direct radiative effect of dust. Usingobservational data on dust abundance, in situ measurements of dust opticalproperties and size distribution, and climate and atmospheric chemicaltransport model simulations of dust lifetime, we find that the dust found inthe atmosphere is substantially coarser than represented in current globalclimate models. Since coarse dust warms climate, the global dust directradiative effect is likely to be less cooling than the ~-0.4 W/m2 estimated bymodels in a current global aerosol model ensemble. Instead, we constrain thedust direct radiative effect to a range between -0.48 and +0.20 W/m2, whichincludes the possibility that dust causes a net warming of the planet.

Smaller desert dust cooling effect estimated from analysis of dust size and abundance