The Warm Winter Paradox in the Pliocene High Latitudes

Reconciling palaeodata with model simulations of the Pliocene climate is essential for understanding a world with atmospheric CO2 concentration near 400 parts per million by volume. Both models and data indicate an amplified warming of the high latitudes during the Pliocene, however terrestrial data suggests Pliocene high latitude temperatures were much higher than can be simulated by models. Here we show that understanding the Pliocene high latitude terrestrial temperatures is particularly difficult for the coldest months, where the temperatures obtained from models and different proxies can vary by more than 20 °C. We refer to this mismatch as the ‘warm winter paradox’. Analysis suggests the warm winter paradox could be due to a number of factors including: model structural uncertainty, proxy data not being strongly constrained by winter temperatures, uncertainties on data reconstruction methods and also that the Pliocene high latitude climate does not have a modern analogue. Refinements to model boundary conditions or proxy dating are unlikely to contribute significantly to the resolution of the warm winter paradox. For the Pliocene, high latitude, terrestrial, summer temperatures, models and different proxies are in good agreement. Those factors which cause uncertainty on winter temperatures are shown to be much less important for the summer. Until some of the uncertainties on winter, high latitude, Pliocene temperatures can be reduced, we suggest a data-model comparison should focus on the summer. This is expected to give more meaningful and accurate results than a data-model comparison which focuses on the annual mean.

Global Terrestrial Ecosystem Carbon Flux Inferred from TanSat XCO2 Retrievals

TanSat is China’s first greenhouse gases observing satellite. In recent years, substantial progresses have been achieved on retrieving column-averaged CO2 dry air mole fraction (XCO2). However, relatively few attempts have been made to estimate terrestrial net ecosystem exchange (NEE) using TanSat XCO2 retrievals. In this study, based on the GEOS-Chem 4D-Var data assimilation system, we infer the global NEE from April 2017 to March 2018 using TanSat XCO2. The inversion estimates global NEE at −3.46 PgC yr-1, evidently higher than prior estimate and giving rise to an improved estimate of global atmospheric CO2 growth rate. Regionally, our inversion greatly increases the carbon uptakes in northern mid-to-high latitudes and significantly enhances the carbon releases in tropical and southern lands, especially in Africa and India peninsula. The increase of posterior sinks in northern lands is mainly attributed to the decreased carbon release during the nongrowing season, and the decrease of carbon uptakes in tropical and southern lands basically occurs throughout the year. Evaluations against independent CO2 observations and comparison with previous estimates indicate that although the land sinks in the northern middle latitudes and southern temperate regions are improved to a certain extent, they are obviously overestimated in northern high latitudes and underestimated in tropical lands (mainly northern Africa), respectively. These results suggest that TanSat XCO2 retrievals may have systematic negative biases in northern high latitudes and large positive biases over northern Africa, and further efforts are required to remove bias in these regions for better estimates of global and regional NEE.

Moist convection drives an upscale energy transfer at Jovian high latitudes

Jupiter’s atmosphere is one of the most turbulent places in the solar system. Whereas observations of lightning and thunderstorms point to moist convection as a small-scale energy source for Jupiter’s large-scale vortices and zonal jets, this has never been demonstrated due to the coarse resolution of pre-Juno measurements. The Juno spacecraft discovered that Jovian high latitudes host a cluster of large cyclones with diameter of around 5,000 km, each associated with intermediate- (roughly between 500 and 1,600 km) and smaller-scale vortices and filaments of around 100 km. Here, we analyse infrared images from Juno with a high resolution of 10 km. We unveil a dynamical regime associated with a significant energy source of convective origin that peaks at 100 km scales and in which energy gets subsequently transferred upscale to the large circumpolar and polar cyclones. Although this energy route has never been observed on another planet, it is surprisingly consistent with idealized studies of rapidly rotating Rayleigh–Bénard convection, lending theoretical support to our analyses. This energy route is expected to enhance the heat transfer from Jupiter’s hot interior to its troposphere and may also be relevant to the Earth’s atmosphere, helping us better understand the dynamics of our own planet.

Changes in the Near-surface Shear Layer of the Sun

We use helioseismic data obtained over two solar cycles to determine whether there are changes in the near-surface shear layer (NSSL). We examine this by determining the radial gradient of the solar rotation rate. The radial gradient itself shows a solar-cycle dependence, and the changes are more pronounced in the active latitudes than at adjoining higher latitudes; results at the highest latitudes (≳70°) are unreliable. The pattern changes with depth, even within the NSSL. We find that the near-surface shear layer is deeper at lower latitudes than at high latitudes and that the extent of the layer also shows a small solar-cycle-related change.

Projected Changes in Terrestrial Vegetation and Carbon Fluxes under 1.5 °C and 2.0 °C Global Warming

The terrestrial ecosystem plays a vital role in regulating the exchange of carbon between land and atmosphere. This study investigates how terrestrial vegetation coverage and carbon fluxes change in a world stabilizing at 1.5 °C and 2 °C warmer than pre-industrial level. Model results derived from 20 Earth System Models (ESMs) under low, middle, and high greenhouse emission scenarios from CMIP5 and CMIP6 are employed to supply the projected results. Although the ESMs show a large spread of uncertainties, the ensemble means of global LAI are projected to increase by 0.04 ± 0.02 and 0.08 ± 0.04 in the 1.5 and 2.0 °C warming worlds, respectively. Vegetation density is projected to decrease only in the Brazilian Highlands due to the decrease of precipitation there. The high latitudes in Eurasia are projected to have stronger increase of LAI in the 2.0 °C warming world compared to that in 1.5 °C warming level caused by the increase of tree coverage. The largest zonal LAI is projected around 70° N while the largest zonal NPP is projected around 60° N and equator. The zonally inhomogeneous increase of vegetation density and productivity relates to the zonally inhomogeneous increase of temperature, which in turn could amplify the latitudinal gradient of temperature with additional warming. Most of the ESMs show uniform increases of global averaged NPP by 10.68 ± 8.60 and 15.42 ± 10.90 PgC year−1 under 1.5 °C and 2.0 °C warming levels, respectively, except in some sparse vegetation areas. The ensemble averaged NEE is projected to increase by 3.80 ± 7.72 and 4.83 ± 10.13 PgC year−1 in the two warming worlds. The terrestrial ecosystem over most of the world could be a stronger carbon sink than at present. However, some dry areas in Amazon and Central Africa may convert to carbon sources in a world with additional 0.5 °C warming. The start of the growing season in the northern high latitudes is projected to advance by less than one month earlier. Five out of 10 CMIP6 ESMs, which use the Land Use Harmonization Project (LUH2) dataset or a prescribed potential vegetation distribution to constrain the future change of vegetation types, do not reduce the model uncertainties in projected LAI and terrestrial carbon fluxes. This may suggest the challenge in optimizing the carbon fluxes modeling in the future.

Anthropogenic aerosol effects on tropospheric circulation and sea surface temperature (1980–2020): separating the role of zonally asymmetric forcings

Anthropogenic aerosols (AAs) induce global and regional tropospheric circulation adjustments due to the radiative energy perturbations. The overall cooling effects of AA, which mask a portion of global warming, have been the subject of many studies but still have large uncertainty. The interhemispheric contrast in AA forcing has also been demonstrated to induce a major shift in atmospheric circulation. However, the zonal redistribution of AA emissions since start of the 20th century, with a notable decline in the Western Hemisphere (North America and Europe) and a continuous increase in the Eastern Hemisphere (South Asia and East Asia), has received less attention. Here we utilize four sets of single-model initial-condition large-ensemble simulations with various combinations of external forcings to quantify the radiative and circulation responses due to the spatial redistribution of AA forcing during 1980–2020. In particular, we focus on the distinct climate responses due to fossil-fuel-related (FF) aerosols emitted from the Western Hemisphere (WH) versus the Eastern Hemisphere (EH). The zonal (west to east) redistribution of FF aerosol emission since the 1980s leads to a weakening negative radiative forcing over the WH mid-to-high latitudes and an enhancing negative radiative forcing over the EH at lower latitudes. Overall, the FF aerosol leads to a northward shift of the Hadley cell and an equatorward shift of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) jet stream. Here, two sets of regional FF simulations (Fix_EastFF1920 and Fix_WestFF1920) are performed to separate the roles of zonally asymmetric aerosol forcings. We find that the WH aerosol forcing, located in the extratropics, dominates the northward shift of the Hadley cell by inducing an interhemispheric imbalance in radiative forcing. On the other hand, the EH aerosol forcing, located closer to the tropics, dominates the equatorward shift of the NH jet stream. The consistent relationship between the jet stream shift and the top-of-atmosphere net solar flux (FSNTOA) gradient suggests that the latter serves as a rule-of-thumb guidance for the expected shift of the NH jet stream. The surface effect of EH aerosol forcing (mainly from low- to midlatitudes) is confined more locally and only induces weak warming over the northeastern Pacific and North Atlantic. In contrast, the WH aerosol reduction leads to a large-scale warming over NH mid-to-high latitudes that largely offsets the cooling over the northeastern Pacific due to EH aerosols. The simulated competing roles of regional aerosol forcings in driving atmospheric circulation and surface temperature responses during the recent decades highlight the importance of considering zonally asymmetric forcings (west to east) and also their meridional locations within the NH (tropical vs. extratropical).