[1] We present results from an intercomparison of 11 different climate models of intermediate complexity, in which the North Atlantic Ocean was subjected to slowly varying changes in freshwater input. All models show a characteristic hysteresis response of the thermohaline circulation to the freshwater forcing; which can be explained by Stommel's salt advection feedback. The width of the hysteresis curves varies between 0.2 and 0.5 Sv in the models. Major differences are found in the location of present-day climate on the hysteresis diagram. In seven of the models, present-day climate for standard parameter choices is found in the bi-stable regime, in four models this climate is in the mono-stable regime. The proximity of the present-day climate to the Stommel bifurcation point, beyond which North Atlantic Deep Water formation cannot be sustained, varies from less than 0.1 Sv to over 0.5 Sv.

By synthesizing recent studies employing a wide range of approaches (modern observations, paleo reconstructions, and climate model simulations), this paper provides a comprehensive review of the linkage between multidecadal Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) variability and Atlantic Multidecadal Variability (AMV) and associated climate impacts. There is strong observational and modeling evidence that multidecadal AMOC variability is a crucial driver of the observed AMV and associated climate impacts and an important source of enhanced decadal predictability and prediction skill. The AMOC‐AMV linkage is consistent with observed key elements of AMV. Furthermore, this synthesis also points to a leading role of the AMOC in a range of AMV‐related climate phenomena having enormous societal and economic implications, for example, Intertropical Convergence Zone shifts; Sahel and Indian monsoons; Atlantic hurricanes; El Niño–Southern Oscillation; Pacific Decadal Variability; North Atlantic Oscillation; climate over Europe, North America, and Asia; Arctic sea ice and surface air temperature; and hemispheric‐scale surface temperature. Paleoclimate evidence indicates that a similar linkage between multidecadal AMOC variability and AMV and many associated climate impacts may also have existed in the preindustrial era, that AMV has enhanced multidecadal power significantly above a red noise background, and that AMV is not primarily driven by external forcing. The role of the AMOC in AMV and associated climate impacts has been underestimated in most state‐of‐the‐art climate models, posing significant challenges but also great opportunities for substantial future improvements in understanding and predicting AMV and associated climate impacts.

A simplified climate model is presented which includes a fully 3-D, frictional geostrophic (FG) ocean component but retains an integration efficiency considerably greater than extant climate models with 3-D, primitive-equation ocean representations (20 kyears of integration can be completed in about a day on a PC). The model also includes an Energy and Moisture Balance atmosphere and a dynamic and thermodynamic sea-ice model. Using a semi-random ensemble of 1,000 simulations, we address both the inverse problem of parameter estimation, and the direct problem of quantifying the uncertainty due to mixing and transport parameters. Our results represent a first attempt at tuning a 3-D climate model by a strictly defined procedure, which nevertheless considers the whole of the appropriate parameter space. Model estimates of meridional overturning and Atlantic heat transport are well reproduced, while errors are reduced only moderately by a doubling of resolution. Model parameters are only weakly constrained by data, while strong correlations between mean error and parameter values are mostly found to be an artefact of single-parameter studies, not indicative of global model behaviour. Single-parameter sensitivity studies can therefore be misleading. Given a single, illustrative scenario of CO 2 increase and fixing the polynomial coefficients governing the extremely simple radiation parameterisation, the spread of model predictions for global mean warming due solely to the transport parameters is around one degree after 100 years forcing, although in a typical 4,000-year ensemble-member simulation, the peak rate of warming in the deep Pacific occurs 400 years after the onset of the forcing. The corresponding uncertainty in Atlantic overturning after 100 years is around 5 Sv, with a small, but non-negligible, probability of a collapse in the long term.

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