Impacts of interruption of the Agulhas leakage on the tropical Atlantic in coupled ocean�Catmosphere simulations

In this paper we use a coupled ocean?Catmosphere model to investigate the impact of the interruption of Agulhas leakage of Indian ocean water on the tropical Atlantic, a region where strong coupled ocean?Catmosphere interactions occur. The effect of a shut down of leakage of Indian ocean water is isolated from the effect of a collapse of the MOC. In our experiments, the ocean model is forced with boundary conditions in the southeastern corner of the domain that correspond to no interocean exchange of Indian ocean water into the Atlantic. The southern boundary condition is taken from the Levitus data and ensures an MOC in the Atlantic. Within this configuration, instead of warm and salty Indian ocean water temperature (cold) and salinity (fresh) anomalies of southern ocean origin propagate into the South Atlantic and eventually reach the equatorial region, mainly in the thermocline. This set up mimics the closure of the ??warm water path?? in favor of the ??cold water path??. As part of the atmospheric response, there is a northward shift of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ). The changes in trade winds lead to reduced Ekman pumping in the equatorial region. This leads to a freshening and warming of the surface waters along the equator. Especially in the Cold Tongue region, the cold and fresh subsurface anomalies do not reach the surface due to the reduced upwelling. The anomaly signals are transported by the equatorial undercurrent and spread away from the equator within the thermocline. Part of the anomaly eventually reaches the Tropical North Atlantic, where it affects the Guinea Dome. Surprisingly, the main effect at the surface is small on the equator and relatively large at the Guinea Dome. In the atmosphere, the northward shift of the ITCZ is associated with a band of negative precipitation anomalies and higher salinities over the Tropical South Atlantic. An important implication of these results is that the modified water characteristics due to a shut down of the Agulhas leakage remain largely unaffected when crossing the equatorial Atlantic and therefore can affect the deepwater formation in the North Atlantic. This supports the hypothesis that the Agulhas leakage is an important source region for climate change and decadal variability of the Atlantic.     

Greenland��s contribution to global sea-level rise by the end of the 21st century

The Greenland ice sheet holds enough water to raise the global sea level with ??7 m. Over the last few decades, observations manifest a substantial increase of the mass loss of this ice sheet. Both enhanced melting and increase of the dynamical discharge, associated with calving at the outlet-glacier fronts, are contributing to the mass imbalance. Using a dynamical and thermodynamical ice-sheet model, and taking into account speed up of outlet glaciers, we estimate Greenland??s contribution to the 21st-century global sea-level rise and the uncertainty of this estimate. Boundary fields of temperature and precipitation extracted from coupled climate-model projections used for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, are applied to the ice-sheet model. We implement a simple parameterization for increased flow of outlet glaciers, which decreases the bias of the modeled present-day surface height. It also allows for taking into account the observed recent increase in dynamical discharge, and it can be used for future projections associated with outlet-glacier speed up. Greenland contributes 0?C17?cm to global sea-level rise by the end of the 21st century. This range includes the uncertainties in climate-model projections, the uncertainty associated with scenarios of greenhouse-gas emissions, as well as the uncertainties in future outlet-glacier discharge. In addition, the range takes into account the uncertainty of the ice-sheet model and its boundary fields.     

Future changes in internal variability of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation

The response of the internal variability of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC) to enhanced atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations has been estimated from an ensemble of climate change scenario runs. In the model, enhanced greenhouse forcing results in a weaker and shallower MOC with reduced internal variability. At the same time at 55°N between 0 and 1,000 m the overturning increases as a result of a change in the area of convection. In a warmer world, new regions of deepwater formation form further north due to the poleward retreat of the sea-ice boundary. The dominant pattern of internal MOC-variability consists of a monopole centered around 35°N. Due to anthropogenic warming this monopole shifts poleward. The shift is associated with a stronger relation between MOC-variations and heat flux variations over the subpolar gyre. In old convective sites (Labrador Sea) convection becomes more irregular which leads to enhanced heat flux variability. In new convective sites heat flux variations initially are related to sea-ice variations. When the sea-ice coverage further decreases they become associated with (irregular) deepwater formation. Both processes act to tighten the relation between subpolar surface heat flux variability and MOC-variability, resulting in a poleward shift of the latter.     

Coupled variability and air-sea interaction in the South Atlantic Ocean

A total of 52 years of data (1949–2000) from the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis are used to investigate mechanisms involved in forcing and damping of sea surface temperature (SST) variability in the South Atlantic Ocean. Organized patterns of coupled ocean–atmosphere variability are identified using EOF and SVD analyses. The leading mode of coupled variability consists of an SST pattern with a strong northeast–southwest gradient and an SLP monopole centered at 15°W, 45°S. The anomalous winds associated with this monopole generate the SST pattern through anomalous latent heat flux and mixed layer deepening. Other heat flux components and anomalous Ekman transport play only a secondary role. Once established, the SST pattern is attenuated through latent heat flux. The higher SST modes are also induced by anomalous winds and destroyed by latent heat flux. It thus appears that the coupled variability in the South Atlantic Ocean consists of atmospheric circulation anomalies that induce SST anomalies through anomalous latent heat fluxes and wind-induced mixed layer deepening. These SST anomalies are destroyed by latent heat flux with no detectable systematic feedback onto the atmospheric circulation. Atmospheric variability in the South Atlantic is found to be largely independent of that elsewhere, although there is a weak relation with ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation).     

A recipe for simulating the interannual variability of the Asian summer monsoon and its relation with ENSO

This study investigates how accurately the interannual variability over the Indian Ocean basin and the relationship between the Indian summer monsoon and the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) can be simulated by different modelling strategies. With a hierarchy of models, from an atmospherical general circulation model (AGCM) forced by observed SST, to a coupled model with the ocean component limited to the tropical Pacific and Indian Oceans, the role of heat fluxes and of interactive coupling is analyzed. Whenever sea surface temperature anomalies in the Indian basin are created by the coupled model, the inverse relationship between the ENSO index and the Indian summer monsoon rainfall is recovered, and it is preserved if the atmospherical model is forced by the SSTs created by the coupled model. If the ocean model domain is limited to the Indian Ocean, changes in the Walker circulation over the Pacific during El-Niño years induce a decrease of rainfall over the Indian subcontinent. However, the observed correlation between ENSO and the Indian Ocean zonal mode (IOZM) is not properly modelled and the two indices are not significantly correlated, independently on season. Whenever the ocean domain extends to the Pacific, and ENSO can impact both the atmospheric circulation and the ocean subsurface in the equatorial Eastern Indian Ocean, modelled precipitation patterns associated both to ENSO and to the IOZM closely resemble the observations.     

Impact of vegetation variability on potential predictability and skill of EC-Earth simulations

Climate models often use a simplified and static representation of vegetation characteristics to determine fluxes of energy, momentum and water vapour between surface and lower atmosphere. In order to analyse the impact of short term variability in vegetation phenology, we use remotely-sensed leaf area index and albedo products to examine the role of vegetation in the coupled land–atmosphere system. Perfect model experiments are carried out to determine the impact of realistic temporal variability of vegetation on potential predictability of evaporation and temperature, as well as model skill of EC-Earth simulations. The length of the simulation period is hereby limited by the availability of satellite products to 2000–2010. While a realistic representation of vegetation positively influences the simulation of evaporation and its potential predictability, a positive impact on 2?m temperature is of smaller magnitude, regionally confined and more pronounced in climatically extreme years.     

EC-Earth V2.2: description and validation of a new seamless earth system prediction model

EC-Earth, a new Earth system model based on the operational seasonal forecast system of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), is presented. The performance of version 2.2 (V2.2) of the model is compared to observations, reanalysis data and other coupled atmosphere–ocean-sea ice models. The large-scale physical characteristics of the atmosphere, ocean and sea ice are well simulated. When compared to other coupled models with similar complexity, the model performs well in simulating tropospheric fields and dynamic variables, and performs less in simulating surface temperature and fluxes. The surface temperatures are too cold, with the exception of the Southern Ocean region and parts of the Northern Hemisphere extratropics. The main patterns of interannual climate variability are well represented. Experiments with enhanced CO₂ concentrations show well-known responses of Arctic amplification, land-sea contrasts, tropospheric warming and stratospheric cooling. The global climate sensitivity of the current version of EC-Earth is slightly less than 1?K/(W?m^?2). An intensification of the hydrological cycle is found and strong regional changes in precipitation, affecting monsoon characteristics. The results show that a coupled model based on an operational seasonal prediction system can be used for climate studies, supporting emerging seamless prediction strategies.     

Boundary layer stability and Arctic climate change: a feedback study using EC-Earth

Amplified Arctic warming is one of the key features of climate change. It is evident in observations as well as in climate model simulations. Usually referred to as Arctic amplification, it is generally recognized that the surface albedo feedback governs the response. However, a number of feedback mechanisms play a role in AA, of which those related to the prevalent near-surface inversion have received relatively little attention. Here we investigate the role of the near-surface thermal inversion, which is caused by radiative surface cooling in autumn and winter, on Arctic warming. We employ idealized climate change experiments using the climate model EC-Earth together with ERA-Interim reanalysis data to show that boundary-layer mixing governs the efficiency by which the surface warming signal is ‘diluted’ to higher levels. Reduced vertical mixing, as in the stably stratified inversion layer in Arctic winter, thus amplifies surface warming. Modelling results suggest that both shortwave—through the (seasonal) interaction with the sea ice feedback—and longwave feedbacks are affected by boundary-layer mixing, both in the Arctic and globally, with the effect on the shortwave feedback dominating. The amplifying effect will decrease, however, with climate warming because the surface inversion becomes progressively weaker. We estimate that the reduced Arctic inversion has slowed down global warming by about 5% over the past 2 decades, and we anticipate that it will continue to do so with ongoing Arctic warming.     

Climate scenarios of sea level rise for the northeast Atlantic Ocean: a study including the effects of ocean dynamics and gravity changes induced by ice melt

Here we present a set of regional climate scenarios of sea level rise for the northeast Atlantic Ocean. In this study, the latest observations and results obtained with state-of-the-art climate models are combined. In addition, regional effects due to ocean dynamics and changes in the Earth’s gravity field induced by melting of land-based ice masses have been taken into account. The climate scenarios are constructed for the target years 2050 and 2100, for both a moderate and a large rise in global mean atmospheric temperature (2 °C and 4 °C in 2100 respectively). The climate scenarios contain contributions from changes in ocean density (global thermal expansion and local steric changes related to changing ocean dynamics) and changes in ocean mass (melting of mountain glaciers and ice caps, changes in the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, and (minor) terrestrial water-storage contributions). All major components depend on the global temperature rise achieved in the target periods considered. The resulting set of climate scenarios represents our best estimate of twenty-first century sea level rise in the northeast Atlantic Ocean, given the current understanding of the various contributions. For 2100, they yield a local rise of 30 to 55 cm and 40 to 80 cm for the moderate and large rise in global mean atmospheric temperature, respectively.