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GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS,
VOL. 34,
L14704,
doi:10.1029/2007GL030221,
2007
Local and remote contributions to Arctic warming
Drew Shindell
NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Center for Climate Systems Research, Columbia University, New York, New York,
USA
Abstract
I investigate the relative impact of local and remote radiative forcing by tropospheric aerosols and ozone on Arctic climate
using GISS climate model simulations. During boreal summer, Arctic climate is well-correlated with either the global or Arctic
forcing. During other seasons, however, large-scale dynamics strongly influence the Arctic, so that the surface temperature
response follows the global or Northern Hemisphere extratropical forcing much more closely. The decoupling is so strong that
Arctic surface temperature trends often show the opposite sign to the local forcing. The analysis also demonstrates that ozone
and aerosols affect Arctic climate more strongly per unit global forcing than well-mixed greenhouse gases, typically 2.5–5
times in non-summer seasons, making them powerful levers for influencing Arctic climate. However, controlling atmospheric
burdens of climate-altering pollutants outside the polar region appears to be at least as important as controlling them within
for mitigation of Arctic warming.
Received 30
March
2007;
accepted 25
June
2007;
published 20
July
2007.
Keywords: Arctic;
climate;
pollutants.
Index Terms: 1610 Global Change: Atmosphere (0315, 0325); 9315 Geographic Location: Arctic region (0718, 4207); 0305 Atmospheric Composition and Structure: Aerosols and particles (0345, 4801, 4906); 1626 Global Change: Global climate models (3337, 4928); 1620 Global Change: Climate dynamics (0429, 3309).
Read Full Article (file size: 183448 bytes) Cited by
Citation: Shindell, D.
(2007),
Local and remote contributions to Arctic warming,
Geophys. Res. Lett.,
34,
L14704,
doi:10.1029/2007GL030221.
This paper is not subject to U.S. copyright. Published in 2007 by the
American Geophysical Union.
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