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Sources of Uncertainty in the Meridional Pattern of Climate Change
Author(s) -
Bonan D. B.,
Armour K. C.,
Roe G. H.,
Siler N.,
Feldl N.
Publication year - 2018
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 - 10.1029/2018gl079429
Subject(s) - zonal and meridional , climatology , environmental science , atmospheric sciences , radiative forcing , latitude , radiative transfer , climate model , middle latitudes , forcing (mathematics) , global warming , climate change , geology , physics , oceanography , geodesy , quantum mechanics
We employ a moist energy balance model (MEBM), representing atmospheric heat transport as the diffusion of near‐surface moist static energy, to evaluate sources of uncertainty in the meridional pattern of surface warming. Given zonal mean patterns of radiative forcing, radiative feedbacks, and ocean heat uptake, the MEBM accurately predicts zonal mean warming as simulated by general circulation models under increased CO 2 . Over a wide range of latitudes, the MEBM captures approximately 90% of the variance in zonal mean warming across the general circulation models, with approximately 70% of the variance attributable to differences in radiative feedbacks alone. Partitioning the radiative feedbacks into individual components shows that the majority of the uncertainty in the meridional pattern of warming arises from uncertainty in cloud feedbacks. Isolating feedback uncertainty within specific regions demonstrates that tropical feedback uncertainty leads to surface warming uncertainty that is global and nearly uniform with latitude, whereas polar feedback uncertainty leads to surface warming uncertainty that is largely confined to the poles.