Sensitivity of climate to cumulative carbon emissions due to compensation of ocean heat and carbon uptake

Goodwin, Philip, Williams, Ric ORCID: 0000-0002-3180-7558 and Ridgwell, Andy (2015) Sensitivity of climate to cumulative carbon emissions due to compensation of ocean heat and carbon uptake. Nature Geoscience, 8 (1). pp. 29-34.

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Abstract

Climate model experiments reveal that transient global warming is nearly proportional to cumulative carbon emissions on multi-decadal to centennial timescales1,2,3,4,5. However, it is not quantitatively understood how this near-linear dependence between warming and cumulative carbon emissions arises in transient climate simulations6,7. Here, we present a theoretically derived equation of the dependence of global warming on cumulative carbon emissions over time. For an atmosphere–ocean system, our analysis identifies a surface warming response to cumulative carbon emissions of 1.5 ± 0.7 K for every 1,000 Pg of carbon emitted. This surface warming response is reduced by typically 10–20% by the end of the century and beyond. The climate response remains nearly constant on multi-decadal to centennial timescales as a result of partially opposing effects of oceanic uptake of heat and carbon8. The resulting warming then becomes proportional to cumulative carbon emissions after many centuries, as noted earlier9. When we incorporate estimates of terrestrial carbon uptake10, the surface warming response is reduced to 1.1 ± 0.5 K for every 1,000 Pg of carbon emitted, but this modification is unlikely to significantly affect how the climate response changes over time. We suggest that our theoretical framework may be used to diagnose the global warming response in climate models and mechanistically understand the differences between their projections.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Biogeochemistry, Climate and Earth system modelling, Ocean sciences, Project and prediction
Subjects:	?? Q1 ?? ?? QE ??
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	11 May 2016 08:50
Last Modified:	19 Jan 2023 07:37
DOI:	10.1038/ngeo2304
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3001190

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• Sensitivity of climate to cumulative carbon emissions due to compensation of ocean heat and carbon uptake. (deposited 30 Jul 2015 15:20)
  • Sensitivity of climate to cumulative carbon emissions due to compensation of ocean heat and carbon uptake. (deposited 11 May 2016 08:50) [Currently Displayed]