Premium
Hiatus‐like decades in the absence of equatorial Pacific cooling and accelerated global ocean heat uptake
Author(s) -
Känel Lukas,
Frölicher Thomas L.,
Gruber Nicolas
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1002/2017gl073578
Subject(s) - hiatus , climatology , pacific decadal oscillation , climate model , global cooling , pacific ocean , ocean heat content , environmental science , centennial , global warming , geology , climate change , el niño southern oscillation , sea surface temperature , oceanography , geography , paleontology , archaeology
A surface cooling pattern in the equatorial Pacific associated with a negative phase of the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation is the leading hypothesis to explain the smaller rate of global warming during 1998–2012, with these cooler than normal conditions thought to have accelerated the oceanic heat uptake. Here using a 30‐member ensemble simulation of a global Earth system model, we show that in 10% of all simulated decades with a global cooling trend, the eastern equatorial Pacific actually warms. This implies that there is a 1 in 10 chance that decadal hiatus periods may occur without the equatorial Pacific being the dominant pacemaker. In addition, the global ocean heat uptake tends to slow down during hiatus decades implying a fundamentally different global climate feedback factor on decadal time scales than on centennial time scales and calling for caution inferring climate sensitivity from decadal‐scale variability.