Examining the Tropical Pacific's Response to Global Warming

Vecchi, Gabriel A.; Clement, A. C.; Soden, Brian J.

doi:10.1029/2008eo090002

Cited by 210 publications

(179 citation statements)

References 21 publications

(30 reference statements)

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“…Furthermore, it has been suggested that sea surface temperature (SST) forcing likely played an important role in the observed Mediterranean wintertime drying (Hoerling et al 2012). The CMIP3 models have biases in their SST response to GHG forcing, especially over the tropical Pacific (Vecchi et al 2008). Our results indicate that the CMIP3 models simulate a relatively uniform increase in 500 Gph in response to anthropogenic forcing (Fig.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 60%

The expectation of future precipitation change over the Mediterranean region is different from what we observe

2012

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In this study we assess the role of anthropogenic forcing (greenhouse gases and sulphate aerosols, GS) in recently observed precipitation trends over the Mediterranean region. We investigate whether the observed precipitation trends (1966-2005 and 1979-2008) are consistent with what 22 models project as response of precipitation to GS forcing. Significance is estimated using 9,000-year control runs derived from the CMIP3 archive. The results indicate that externally forced changes are detectable in observed precipitation trends in winter, late summer and in autumn. Natural internal climate variability cannot explain these changes. However, the observed trends (derived from 3 sources) are markedly inconsistent with expected changes due to GS forcing. While the influence of GS signal is detectable in winter and early spring, observed changes are several times larger than the projected response to GS forcing. The most striking inconsistency, however, is the contradiction between projected drying and the observed increase in precipitation in late summer and autumn, irrespective of the data set used. Natural (internal) variability as estimated from the models cannot account for these inconsistencies, which are already present in the large scale circulation patterns (Geopotential height at 500 hPa). The obtained results are robust to the removal of the fingerprint of the North Atlantic Oscillation. The detection of an outright sign mismatch of observed and projected trends in autumn and late summer, leads us to conclude that the recently observed trends can not be used as an illustration of plausible future expected change in the Mediterranean region. These significant shortcomings in our understanding of recent observed changes complicate communication of future expected changes in Mediterranean precipitation.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 60%

The expectation of future precipitation change over the Mediterranean region is different from what we observe

2012

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“…The latter also include additional in situ observations from the UK Meteorological Office archive which are not included in the former (Vecchi and Soden, 2007). Vecchi et al (2008) describe how inconsistencies of the various SST reconstructions in the equatorial eastern Pacific provide different results between the NOAA and HadISST data. We have carried out our analysis for both datasets but it did not alter our main results and here we present only results with the NOAA dataset.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Solar cycle signals in sea level pressure and sea surface temperature

2010

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Abstract. We identify solar cycle signals in 155 years of global sea level pressure (SLP) and sea surface temperature (SST) data using a multiple linear regression approach. In SLP we find in the North Pacific a statistically significant weakening of the Aleutian Low and a northward shift of the Hawaiian High in response to higher solar activity, confirming the results of previous authors using different techniques. We also find a weak but broad reduction in pressure across the equatorial Pacific. In SST we identify a weak El Niño-like pattern in the tropics for the 155 year period, unlike the strong La Niña-like signal found recently by some other authors. We show that the latter have been influenced by the technique of compositing data from peak years of the sunspot cycle because these years have often coincided with the negative phase of the ENSO cycle. Furthermore, the date of peak annual sunspot number (SSN) generally falls a year or more in advance of the broader maximum of the 11-year solar cycle so that analyses which incorporate data from all years represent more coherently the difference between periods of high and low solar activity on these timescales. We also find that studies of the solar signal in SST over the second half of the 20th century may alias as ENSO signal if this is not properly taken into account.

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“…SST trends in the equatorial Pacific Ocean are especially controversial due to the discrepancy in the sign of the trend in the central and eastern Pacific among various SST datasets (Vecchi et al 2008;Karnauskas et al 2009;Deser et al 2010a). However, the disparity in trend largely arises from the coverage and quality of in situ observations in the centennial record, particularly during the early decades of the twentieth century (Deser et al 2010a;Giese et al 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Linear trends in sea surface temperature of the tropical Pacific Ocean and implications for the El Niño-Southern Oscillation

L’Heureux¹,

Collins²,

Hu³

2012

Clim Dyn

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A principal component decomposition of monthly sea surface temperature (SST) variability in the tropical Pacific Ocean demonstrates that nearly all of the linear trends during 1950-2010 are found in two leading patterns. The first SST pattern is strongly related to the canonical El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) pattern. The second pattern shares characteristics with the first pattern and its existence solely depends on the presence of linear trends across the tropical Pacific Ocean. The decomposition also uncovers a third pattern, often referred to as ENSO Modoki, but the linear trend is small and dataset dependent over the full 61-year record and is insignificant within each season. ENSO Modoki is also reflected in the equatorial zonal SST gradient between the Niño-4 region, located in the west-central Pacific, and the Niño-3 region in the eastern Pacific.

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Examining the Tropical Pacific's Response to Global Warming

Cited by 210 publications

References 21 publications

The expectation of future precipitation change over the Mediterranean region is different from what we observe

The expectation of future precipitation change over the Mediterranean region is different from what we observe

Solar cycle signals in sea level pressure and sea surface temperature

Linear trends in sea surface temperature of the tropical Pacific Ocean and implications for the El Niño-Southern Oscillation

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