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To: Phil Jones <p.jones@uea.ac.uk>
Subject: Wengen section
Date: Mon, 28 May 2007 04:51:11 -0400 (EDT)
Reply-to: gschmidt@giss.nasa.gov
Cc: mann@psu.edu, Caspar Ammann <ammann@ucar.edu>
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Hi Phil, sorry for the long delay. But here is a first draft of the
forcings and models section I was supposed to take the lead on. Hopefully,
we can merge that with whatever Caspar has.
Thanks
Gavin
================
Histories (CA)
How models see the forcings, especially wrt aerosols/ozone and
increasing model complexities (GS)
While there are good records for some factors (particularly the well
mixed greenhouse gases such as CO2 and CH4), records for others are
either hopelessly incomplete (dust, vegetation) due to poor spatial or
temporal resolution or non-existant (e.g. ozone). Thus estimates of
the magnitude of these forcings can only be made using a model-based
approach. This can be done using GCMs that include more Earth system
components (interactive aerosols, chemistry, dynamic vegetation,
carbon cycles etc.), but these models are still very much a work in
progress and have not been used extensively for paleo-climatic
purposes. Some initial attempts have been made for select feedbacks
and forcings (Gerber et al, 2003; Goosse et al 2006) but a
comprehensive assessment over the millennia prior to the
pre-industrial does not yet exist.
Even for those forcings for which good records exist, there is a
question of they are represented within the models. This is not so
much of an issue for the well-mixed greenhouse gases (CO2, N2O, CH4)
since there is a sophisticated literature and history of including
them within models (IPCC, 2001) though some aspects, such as minor
short-wave absorption effects for CH4 and N2O are still not universally
included
(Collins et al, 2006). However, solar effects have been treated in
quite varied ways.
Aerosol changes over the last few milllenia are very poorly constrained
(if at all). These might have arisen from climatically or human driven
changes in dust emissions, ocean biology feedbacks on circulation change,
or climate impacts on the emission volatile organics from plants (which
also have an impact on ozone chemistry). Some work on modelling a subset
of those effects has been done for the last glacial maximum or the 8.2 kyr
event (LeGrande et al, 2006), but there have been no quantitative
estimates for the late Holocene (prior to the industrial period).
Due to the relative expense of doing millennial simulations with
state-of-the-art GCMs, exisiting simulations have generally done the
minimum required to include relevant solar, GHG and volcanic forcings.
Progress can be expected relatively soon on more sophisticated treatments
of those forcings and the first quantitative estimates of additional
effects.
=============
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