Observations show that the Southern Hemisphere zonal wind stress maximum has increased significantly over the past 30 years. Eddy-resolving ocean models show that the resulting increase in the ...Southern Ocean mean flow meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is partially compensated by an increase in the eddy MOC. This effect can be reproduced in the non-eddy-resolving ocean component of a climate model, providing the eddy parameterization coefficient is variable and not a constant. If the coefficient is a constant, then the Southern Ocean mean MOC change is balanced by an unrealistically large change in the Atlantic Ocean MOC. Southern Ocean eddy compensation means that Southern Hemisphere winds cannot be the dominant mechanism driving midlatitude North Atlantic MOC variability.
•A review of AMOC stability in ocean alone and coupled climate models.•Comments on the very frequently used AMOC stability criterion.•Comments on the use of flux adjusted climate models.•Comments on ...AMOC stability in eddy-resolving versus non-eddy-resolving ocean components.
The stability of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) in ocean models depends quite strongly on the model formulation, especially the vertical mixing, and whether it is coupled to an atmosphere model. A hysteresis loop in AMOC strength with respect to freshwater forcing has been found in several intermediate complexity climate models and in one fully coupled climate model that has very coarse resolution. Over 40% of modern climate models are in a bistable AMOC state according to the very frequently used simple stability criterion which is based solely on the sign of the AMOC freshwater transport across 33° S. In a recent freshwater hosing experiment in a climate model with an eddy-permitting ocean component, the change in the gyre freshwater transport across 33° S is larger than the AMOC freshwater transport change. This casts very strong doubt on the usefulness of this simple AMOC stability criterion. If a climate model uses large surface flux adjustments, then these adjustments can interfere with the atmosphere–ocean feedbacks, and strongly change the AMOC stability properties. AMOC can be shut off for many hundreds of years in modern fully coupled climate models if the hosing or carbon dioxide forcing is strong enough. However, in one climate model the AMOC recovers after between 1000 and 1400 years. Recent 1% increasing carbon dioxide runs and RCP8.5 future scenario runs have shown that the AMOC reduction is smaller using an eddy-resolving ocean component than in the comparable standard 1° ocean climate models.
Histogram of the Denver maximum temperature on 30 Nov between 1991 and 2020. ...whether looking across a particular period of time or across the 30 years used to make the normal values, the Denver ...high temperature is only close to the normal value a small percentage of the time. ...one might conclude that it is “quite unusual” for the high temperature to be close to the normal value. 3. ...in Denver they are often far from the average values, which is indicated by the record high and low values for a particular day frequently being ±30°F, or more, from the average values, especially in winter; see Fig. 1 for example.
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The fourth version of the Community Climate System Model (CCSM4) was recently completed and released to the climate community. This paper describes developments to all CCSM components, and documents ...fully coupled preindustrial control runs compared to the previous version, CCSM3. Using the standard atmosphere and land resolution of 1° results in the sea surface temperature biases in the major upwelling regions being comparable to the 1.4°-resolution CCSM3. Two changes to the deep convection scheme in the atmosphere component result in CCSM4 producing El Niño–Southern Oscillation variability with a much more realistic frequency distribution than in CCSM3, although the amplitude is too large compared to observations. These changes also improve the Madden–Julian oscillation and the frequency distribution of tropical precipitation. A new overflow parameterization in the ocean component leads to an improved simulation of the Gulf Stream path and the North Atlantic Ocean meridional overturning circulation. Changes to the CCSM4 land component lead to a much improved annual cycle of water storage, especially in the tropics. The CCSM4 sea ice component uses much more realistic albedos than CCSM3, and for several reasons the Arctic sea ice concentration is improved in CCSM4. An ensemble of twentieth-century simulations produces a good match to the observed September Arctic sea ice extent from 1979 to 2005. The CCSM4 ensemble mean increase in globally averaged surface temperature between 1850 and 2005 is larger than the observed increase by about 0.4°C. This is consistent with the fact that CCSM4 does not include a representation of the indirect effects of aerosols, although other factors may come into play. The CCSM4 still has significant biases, such as the mean precipitation distribution in the tropical Pacific Ocean, too much low cloud in the Arctic, and the latitudinal distributions of shortwave and longwave cloud forcings.
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Results from two perturbation experiments using the Community Climate System Model version 4 where the Southern Hemisphere zonal wind stress is increased are described. It is shown that the ocean ...response is in accord with experiments using much-higher-resolution ocean models that do not use an eddy parameterization. The key to obtaining an appropriate response in the coarse-resolution climate model is to specify a variable coefficient in the Gent and McWilliams eddy parameterization, rather than a constant value. This result contrasts with several recent papers that have suggested that coarse-resolution climate models cannot obtain an appropriate response.
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The dynamics of the lower cell of the meridional overturning circulation (MOC) in the Southern Ocean are compared in two versions of a global climate model: one with high-resolution (0.1°) ocean and ...sea ice and the other a lower-resolution (1.0°) counterpart. In the high-resolution version, the lower cell circulation is stronger and extends farther northward into the abyssal ocean. Using the water-mass-transformation framework, it is shown that the differences in the lower cell circulation between resolutions are explained by greater rates of surface water-mass transformation within the higher-resolution Antarctic sea ice pack and by differences in diapycnal-mixing-induced transformation in the abyssal ocean.
While both surface and interior transformation processes work in tandemto sustain the lower cell in the control climate, the circulation is far more sensitive to changes in surface transformation in response to atmospheric warming from raising carbon dioxide levels. The substantial reduction in overturning is primarily attributed to reduced surface heat loss. At high resolution, the circulation slows more dramatically, with an anomaly that reaches deeper into the abyssal ocean and alters the distribution of Southern Ocean warming. The resolution dependence of associated heat uptake is particularly pronounced in the abyssal ocean (below 4000m), where the higher-resolution version of the model warms 4.5 times more than its lower-resolution counterpart.
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Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity Danabasoglu, Gokhan; Gent, Peter R.
Journal of climate,
05/2009, Letnik:
22, Številka:
9
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
The equilibrium climate sensitivity of a climate model is usually defined as the globally averaged equilibrium surface temperature response to a doubling of carbon dioxide. This is virtually always ...estimated in a version with a slab model for the upper ocean. The question is whether this estimate is accurate for the full climate model version, which includes a full-depth ocean component. This question has been answered for the low-resolution version of the Community Climate System Model, version 3 (CCSM3). The answer is that the equilibrium climate sensitivity using the full-depth ocean model is 0.14°C higher than that using the slab ocean model, which is a small increase. In addition, these sensitivity estimates have a standard deviation of nearly 0.1°C because of interannual variability. These results indicate that the standard practice of using a slab ocean model does give a good estimate of the equilibrium climate sensitivity of the full CCSM3. Another question addressed is whether the effective climate sensitivity is an accurate estimate of the equilibrium climate sensitivity. Again the answer is yes, provided that at least 150 yr of data from the doubled carbon dioxide run are used.
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The Community Climate System Model, version 2 (CCSM2) is briefly described. A 1000-yr control simulation of the present day climate has been completed without flux adjustments. Minor modifications ...were made at year 350, which included all five components using the same physical constants. There are very small trends in the upper-ocean, sea ice, atmosphere, and land fields after year 150 of the control simulation. The deep ocean has small but significant trends; however, these are not large enough that the control simulation could not be continued much further. The equilibrium climate sensitivity of CCSM2 is 2.2 K, which is slightly larger than the Climate System Model, version 1 (CSM1) value of 2.0 K.
Several aspects of the control simulation’s mean climate and interannual variability are described, and good and bad properties of the control simulation are documented. In particular, several aspects of the simulation, especially in the Arctic region, are much improved over those obtained in CSM1. Other aspects, such as the tropical Pacific region simulation, have not been improved much compared to those in CSM1. Priorities for further model development are discussed in the conclusions section.
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It has now been 20
years since the Gent and McWilliams paper on “Isopycnal Mixing in Ocean Circulation Models” was published in January 1990 issue of the Journal of Physical Oceanography. That paper ...was highlighted at the CLIVAR Working Group on Ocean Model Development “Workshop on Ocean Mesoscale Eddies” which was held at the UK Meteorological Office in April 2009, and this review paper is based on the talk given at that Workshop. It contains some hindsights on how the parameterization of the effect of mesoscale eddies on the mean flow came about; which is a question that I am asked quite often. A few important results from including the parameterization in a non-eddy-resolving ocean model are recalled. Including this parameterization, along with other improvements to all the components, in the first version of the Community Climate System Model resulted in the first non-drifting control simulation in a climate model that did not require flux corrections. Also included are brief comments on how the Gent and McWilliams eddy parameterization has been modified and improved since the original proposal in 1990.
Robust and nonrobust aspects of Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) variability and mechanisms are analyzed in several 600-yr simulations with the Community Earth System Model. The ...simulations consist of a set of cases where a few loosely constrained ocean model parameter values are changed, a pair of cases where round-off level perturbations are applied to the initial atmospheric temperature field, and a millennium-scale integration. The time scales of variability differ among the cases with the dominant periods ranging from decadal to centennial. These dominant periods are not stationary in time, indicating that a robust characterization of AMOC temporal variability requires long, multimillennium-scale simulations. A robust aspect is that positive anomalies of the Labrador Sea (LS) upper-ocean density and boundary layer depth and the positive phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation lead AMOC strengthening by 2–3 years. Respective contributions of temperature and salinity to these density anomalies vary across the simulations, but in a majority of the cases temperature contributions dominate. Following an AMOC intensification, all cases show that advection of warm and salty waters into the LS region results in near-neutral density anomalies. Analysis of the LS heat budget indicates that temperature acts to increase density in all cases prior to an AMOC intensification, primarily due to losses by sensible and latent heat fluxes. The accompanying salt budget analysis reveals that the salt contribution to density anomalies varies across the cases, taking both positive and negative values.
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