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Altitude dependence of atmospheric temperature trends: Climate models versus observation
Author(s) -
Douglass David H.,
Pearson Benjamin D.,
Singer S. Fred
Publication year - 2004
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 - 10.1029/2004gl020103
Subject(s) - atmospheric sciences , climatology , environmental science , altitude (triangle) , forcing (mathematics) , troposphere , climate model , general circulation model , lapse rate , greenhouse gas , climate change , radiative forcing , mathematics , geology , oceanography , geometry
As a consequence of greenhouse forcing, all state‐of‐the‐art general circulation models predict a positive temperature trend that is greater for the troposphere than the surface. This predicted positive trend increases in value with altitude until it reaches a maximum ratio with respect to the surface of as much as 1.5 to 2.0 at about 200–400 hPa. However, the temperature trends from several independent observational data sets show decreasing as well as mostly negative values. This disparity indicates that the three models examined here fail to account for the effects of greenhouse forcings.