The Response of the Polar Regions to Increased CO2 in a Global Climate Model with Elastic--Viscous--Plastic Sea Ice
Loading...
Authors
Zhang, Yuxia
Weatherly, John W.
Subjects
Advisors
Date of Issue
2001-02-01
Date
February 1, 2001
Publisher
Language
Abstract
A global atmosphere–ocean–sea ice general circulation model (GCM) is used in simulations of climate with
present-day atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and with CO2 increasing to double the present-day values. The
Parallel Climate Model includes the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) atmospheric GCM, the
Los Alamos National Laboratory ocean GCM, and the Naval Postgraduate School dynamic–thermodynamic sea
ice model. The ocean and sea ice grids are at substantially higher resolution than has been previously used in
global climate models. The model is implemented on distributed, parallel computer architectures to make computation
on the high-resolution grids feasible. The sea ice dynamics uses an elastic–viscous–plastic ice rheology
with an explicit solution of the ice stress tensor, which has not previously been used in a coupled, global climate
model.
The simulations of sea ice and the polar climate in the present-day experiment are compared with observed
ice and climate data. The ice cover is too extensive in both hemispheres, leading to a large area of lower-thanobserved
surface temperatures. The Arctic exhibits a persistent high pressure system that drives the ice motion
anticyclonically around the central Arctic. The ice thickness is greatest near the Chukchi Peninsula. Ice is
exported through the Fram Strait, though the Canadian Archipelago, and inward through the Bering Strait. The
modeled Antarctic sea ice moves at a faster speed than the observational data suggest. Many of the results and
biases of the model are similar to those of the NCAR Climate System Model, which has the same atmospheric
model component.
The response of the model to the increase in CO2 shows a significant thinning of the Arctic sea ice by 0.5
m but only a 10% decrease in ice area. Ice concentrations are reduced within the ice pack, while the ice edges
are relatively unchanged. The Antarctic sea ice exhibits much less change in area and little change in thickness,
in agreement with the reduced warming in the entire Southern Hemisphere.
Type
Article
Description
The article of record as published may be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442
Series/Report No
Department
Organization
Naval Postgraduate School (U.S.)
Identifiers
NPS Report Number
Sponsors
Parallel Climate Model effort headed by Dr. Warren Washington
Climate Change Prediction Program of the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation
NCAR Climate Simulation Laboratory
DOE National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center
Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Advanced Computing Laboratory (ACL)
Climate Change Prediction Program of the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation
NCAR Climate Simulation Laboratory
DOE National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center
Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Advanced Computing Laboratory (ACL)
Funder
Parallel Climate Model effort headed by Dr. Warren Washington
Climate Change Prediction Program of the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation
NCAR Climate Simulation Laboratory
DOE National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center
Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Advanced Computing Laboratory (ACL)
Climate Change Prediction Program of the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation
NCAR Climate Simulation Laboratory
DOE National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center
Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Advanced Computing Laboratory (ACL)
Format
16 p.
Citation
The Response of the Polar Regions to Increased CO2 in a Global Climate Model with Elastic–Viscous–Plastic Sea Ice
John W. Weatherly
U.S. Army Cold Region Research and Engineering Laboratory, Hanover, New Hampshire Yuxia Zhang
U.S. Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California (February 1, 2001)
Distribution Statement
Rights
This publication is a work of the U.S. Government as defined in Title 17, United States Code, Section 101. Copyright protection is not available for this work in the United States.