The climate policy narrative for a dangerously warming world

Sanford, T. J.; Frumhoff, Peter C.; Luers, Amy; Gulledge, Jay

doi:10.1038/nclimate2148

Cited by 204 publications

(136 citation statements)

References 11 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

133

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, since the 2015 COP21 Paris agreement, a more ambitious mitigation objective to BHold the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C^has been proposed (UNFCCC 2015). At the same time, if the current trajectory of greenhouse emissions continues, we could end up with more than 3°C GMT rise (Sanford et al 2014). Hence 1.5, 2 and 3°C GMT rise are important milestones, not only for mitigation but also to understand the expected impacts of climate change.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of climate change on European hydrology at 1.5, 2 and 3 degrees mean global warming above preindustrial level

et al. 2017

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Impacts of climate change at 1.5, 2 and 3°C mean global warming above preindustrial level are investigated and compared for runoff, discharge and snowpack in Europe. Ensembles of climate projections representing each of the warming levels were assembled to describe the hydro-meteorological climate at 1.5, 2 and 3°C. These ensembles were then used to force an ensemble of five hydrological models and changes to hydrological indicators were calculated. It is seen that there are clear changes in local impacts on evapotranspiration, mean, low and high runoff and snow water equivalent between a 1.5, 2 and 3°C degree warmer world. In a warmer world, the hydrological impacts of climate change are more intense and spatially more extensive. Robust increases in runoff affect the Scandinavian mountains at 1.5°C, but at 3°C extend over most of Norway, Sweden and northern Poland. At 3°C, Norway is affected by robust changes in all indicators. Decreases in mean annual runoff are seen only in Portugal at 1.5°C warming, but at 3°C warming, decreases to runoff are seen around the entire Iberian coast, the Balkan Coast and parts of the French coast. In affected parts of Europe, there is a distinct increase in the changes to mean, low and high runoff at 2°C compared to 1.5°C, strengthening the case for mitigation to lower levels of global warming. Between 2 and 3°C, the changes in low and high runoff levels continue to increase, but the Climatic Change (2017) 143: 13-26 DOI 10.100713-26 DOI 10. /s10584-017-1971 Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10584-017-1971-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of climate change on European hydrology at 1.5, 2 and 3 degrees mean global warming above preindustrial level

et al. 2017

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…RCP8.5 has the greatest increase in greenhouse gases of the scenarios used in the IPCC AR5 and thus should have the greatest signal-to-noise ratio and indicate the potential for the greatest changes in extremes. In addition, actual greenhouse gas emissions have mostly closely matched RCP8.5 of all of the AR5 scenarios since their initiation in 2005 (Sanford et al, 2014).…”

Section: Cmipmentioning

confidence: 80%

Projected sea surface temperatures over the 21st century: Changes in the mean, variability and extremes for large marine ecosystem regions of Northern Oceans

Alexander

Scott

Friedland

et al. 2018

Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene

203

191

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Global climate models were used to assess changes in the mean, variability and extreme sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in northern oceans with a focus on large marine ecosystems (LMEs) adjacent to North America, Europe, and the Arctic Ocean. Results were obtained from 26 models in the Community Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) archive and 30 simulations from the National Center for Atmospheric Research Large Ensemble Community Project (CESM-LENS). All of the simulations used the observed greenhouse gas concentrations for 1976–2005 and the RCP8.5 “business as usual” scenario for greenhouse gases through the remainder of the 21st century. In general, differences between models are substantially larger than among the simulations in the CESM-LENS, indicating that the SST changes are more strongly affected by model formulation than internal climate variability. The annual SST trends over 1976–2099 in the 18 LMEs examined here are all positive ranging from 0.05 to 0.5°C decade–1. SST changes by the end of the 21st century are primarily due to a positive shift in the mean with only modest changes in the variability in most LMEs, resulting in a substantial increase in warm extremes and decrease in cold extremes. The shift in the mean is so large that in many regions SSTs during 2070–2099 will always be warmer than the warmest year during 1976–2005. The SST trends are generally stronger in summer than in winter, as greenhouse gas heating is integrated over a much shallower climatological mixed layer depth in summer than in winter, which amplifies the seasonal cycle of SST over the 21st century. In the Arctic, the mean SST and its variability increases substantially during summer, when it is ice free, but not during winter when a thin layer of ice reforms and SSTs remain near the freezing point.

show abstract

“…In this study, we chose RCP8.5 as our future warming scenario for two reasons: (i) we aimed to follow the current trajectory, which points beyond the RCP8.5 scenario given the observed trends (Sanford et al, 2014), and (ii) we intended to capture the furthest range presented by RCPs, as that is the extent to be considered for the assessment of ecosystem responses and mitigation efforts. However, we found the ENSO signal as identified by the EOT method to be very weak in the GCM outputs, and for the future simulations we intensified the ENSO signal such that very strong ENSO years can also be experienced as in the real-world case.…”

Section: Scenario Selection and Future Simulationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The influence of El Niño–Southern Oscillation regimes on eastern African vegetation and its future implications under the RCP8.5 warming scenario

et al. 2017

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Abstract. The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the main driver of the interannual variability in eastern African rainfall, with a significant impact on vegetation and agriculture and dire consequences for food and social security. In this study, we identify and quantify the ENSO contribution to the eastern African rainfall variability to forecast future eastern African vegetation response to rainfall variability related to a predicted intensified ENSO. To differentiate the vegetation variability due to ENSO, we removed the ENSO signal from the climate data using empirical orthogonal teleconnection (EOT) analysis. Then, we simulated the ecosystem carbon and water fluxes under the historical climate without components related to ENSO teleconnections. We found ENSO-driven patterns in vegetation response and confirmed that EOT analysis can successfully produce coupled tropical Pacific sea surface temperature-eastern African rainfall teleconnection from observed datasets. We further simulated eastern African vegetation response under future climate change as it is projected by climate models and under future climate change combined with a predicted increased ENSO intensity. Our EOT analysis highlights that climate simulations are still not good at capturing rainfall variability due to ENSO, and as we show here the future vegetation would be different from what is simulated under these climate model outputs lacking accurate ENSO contribution. We simulated considerable differences in eastern African vegetation growth under the influence of an intensified ENSO regime which will bring further environmental stress to a region with a reduced capacity to adapt effects of global climate change and food security.

show abstract

The climate policy narrative for a dangerously warming world

Abstract: It is time to acknowledge that global average temperatures are likely to rise above the 2 °C policy target and consider how that deeply troubling prospect should affect priorities for communicating and managing the risks of a dangerously warming climate.

Cited by 204 publications

References 11 publications

Impacts of climate change on European hydrology at 1.5, 2 and 3 degrees mean global warming above preindustrial level

Impacts of climate change on European hydrology at 1.5, 2 and 3 degrees mean global warming above preindustrial level

Projected sea surface temperatures over the 21st century: Changes in the mean, variability and extremes for large marine ecosystem regions of Northern Oceans

The influence of El Niño–Southern Oscillation regimes on eastern African vegetation and its future implications under the RCP8.5 warming scenario

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About