Understanding Causes and Effects of Rapid Warming in the Arctic

Wendisch, Manfred; Brückner, M.; Burrows, John P.; Crewell, Susanne; Dethloff, Klaus; Ebell, Kerstin; Lüpkes, Christof; Macke, Andreas; Notholt, Justus; Quaas, Johannes; Rinke, Annette; Tegen, Ina

doi:10.1029/2017eo064803

Cited by 126 publications

(131 citation statements)

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“…Also based in Ny-Ålesund was the ACLOUD (Arctic CLoud and Observations Using airborne measurements during polar Day) campaign, with measurements from 22 May to 28 June 2017 (Wendisch et al, 2018). Again, the BC concentrations were measured with an SP2 aboard the AWI Polar 5 aircraft.…”

Section: Aircraft Campaignsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The near-surface temperatures in the Arctic are warming at about twice the rate of the global average (Trenberth et al, 2007;Wendisch et al, 2017). Global climate models have struggled to reproduce the strength of this Arctic-specific enhanced warming, which is commonly referred to as Arctic amplification (AA; Shindell, 2007;Sand et al, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The importance of the representation of air pollution emissions for the modeled distribution and radiative effects of black carbon in the Arctic

et al. 2019

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Aerosol particles can contribute to the Arctic amplification (AA) by direct and indirect radiative effects. Specifically, black carbon (BC) in the atmosphere, and when deposited on snow and sea ice, has a positive warming effect on the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) radiation balance during the polar day. Current climate models, however, are still struggling to reproduce Arctic aerosol conditions. We present an evaluation study with the global aerosol-climate model ECHAM6.3-HAM2.3 to examine emission-related uncertainties in the BC distribution and the direct radiative effect of BC. The model results are comprehensively compared against the latest ground and airborne aerosol observations for the period 2005-2017, with a focus on BC. Four different setups of air pollution emissions are tested. The simulations in general match well with the observed amount and temporal variability in near-surface BC in the Arctic. Using actual daily instead of fixed biomass burning emissions is crucial for reproducing individual pollution events but has only a small influence on the seasonal cycle of BC. Compared with commonly used fixed anthropogenic emissions for the year 2000, an up-to-date inventory with transient air pollution emissions results in up to a 30 % higher annual BC burden locally. This causes a higher annual mean all-sky net direct radiative effect of BC of over 0.1 W m −2 at the top of the atmosphere over the Arctic region (60-90 • N), being locally more than 0.2 W m −2 over the eastern Arctic Ocean. We estimate BC in the Arctic as leading to an annual net gain of 0.5 W m −2 averaged over the Arctic region but to a local gain of up to 0.8 W m −2 by the direct radiative effect of atmospheric BC plus the effect by the BC-in-snow albedo reduction. Long-range transport is identified as one of the main sources of uncertainties for ECHAM6.3-HAM2.3, leading to an overestimation of BC in atmospheric layers above 500 hPa, especially in summer. This is related to a misrepresentation in wet removal in one identified case at least, which was observed during the ARCTAS (Arctic Research of the Composition of the Troposphere from Aircraft and Satellites) summer aircraft campaign. Overall, the current model version has significantly improved since previous intercomparison studies and now performs better than the multi-model average in the Aerosol Comparisons between Observation and Models (AEROCOM) initiative in terms of the spatial and temporal distribution of Arctic BC.

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Section: Aircraft Campaignsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The importance of the representation of air pollution emissions for the modeled distribution and radiative effects of black carbon in the Arctic

et al. 2019

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“…To approach the comprehensive characterization of macroand micro-physical cloud parameters in Ny-Ålesund, a 94 GHz frequency modulated continuous wave cloud radar (Küchler et al, 2017) was installed on the roof of the AW-IPEV atmospheric observatory in June 2016 by the University of Cologne within the framework of the Transregional Collaborative Research Center's (TR 172) "ArctiC Amplification: Climate Relevant Atmospheric and SurfaCe Processes, and Feedback Mechanisms (AC) 3 " (Wendisch et al, 2017). The cloud radar provides vertical profiles of radar reflectivity factor, Doppler velocity, and Doppler spectral width from 150 m to 10 km above ground.…”

Section: Cloud Base Height As An Auxiliary For In Situ and Remote Senmentioning

confidence: 99%

Twenty-five years of cloud base height measurements by ceilometer in Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard

Maturilli

Ebell

2018

Earth Syst. Sci. Data

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Abstract. Clouds are a key factor for the Arctic amplification of global warming, but their actual appearance and distribution are still afflicted by large uncertainty. On the Arctic-wide scale, large discrepancies are found between the various reanalyses and satellite products, respectively. Although ground-based observations by remote sensing are limited to point measurements, they have the advantage of obtaining extended time series of vertically resolved cloud properties. Here, we present a 25-year data record of cloud base height measured by ceilometer at the Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, Arctic site. We explain the composition of the three sub-periods with different instrumentation contributing to the data set, and show examples of potential application areas. Linked to cyclonic activity, the cloud base height provides essential information for the interpretation of the surface radiation balance and contributes to the understanding of meteorological processes. Furthermore, it is a useful auxiliary component for the analysis of advanced technologies that provide insight into cloud microphysical properties, like the cloud radar. The long-term time series also allows derivation of an annual cycle of the cloud occurrence frequency, revealing the more frequent cloud cover in summer and the lowest cloud cover amount in April. However, as the use of different ceilometer instruments over the years potentially imposed inhomogeneities onto the data record, any long-term trend analysis should be avoided.

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“…As the estimated INP concentration based on aerosol measurements do not show clear conditions in the Arctic (see Fig. 13), a possible explanation for the large number of Type 1a/mostly liquid clouds could be a lack of biological INP at the time and location of our Arctic measurements as predicted in a model study by Wilson et al (2015), so those clouds might not freeze at low temperatures (Shupe et al, 2008;Augustin-Bauditz et al, 2014). This might explain the lack of ice crystals, even though -possibly due to the low altitude of those warm layers (see Fig.…”

Section: Arctic Cloudsmentioning

confidence: 80%

Replies to Referee 2

Costa¹

2017

Preprint

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Understanding Causes and Effects of Rapid Warming in the Arctic

Abstract: A new German research consortium is investigating why near-surface air temperatures in the Artic are rising more quickly than in the rest of the world.

Cited by 126 publications

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The importance of the representation of air pollution emissions for the modeled distribution and radiative effects of black carbon in the Arctic

The importance of the representation of air pollution emissions for the modeled distribution and radiative effects of black carbon in the Arctic

Twenty-five years of cloud base height measurements by ceilometer in Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard

Replies to Referee 2

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