Total volcanic stratospheric aerosol optical depths and implications for global climate change
Name
Solomon_Total volcanic.pdf
Size
1.57 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
490f84c8de73b7aefb3348490f6295b4
Author(s)
Barnes, J. E.
Burlakov, V. D.
Deshler, T.
Dolgii, S. I.
Herber, A. B.
Nagai, T.
Neely, R. R.
Nevzorov, A. V.
Ritter, C.
Sakai, T.
Date Issued
November 2014
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
Publisher
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
Citation
Ridley, D. A., S. Solomon, J. E. Barnes, V. D. Burlakov, T. Deshler, S. I. Dolgii, A. B. Herber, et al. “Total Volcanic Stratospheric Aerosol Optical Depths and Implications for Global Climate Change.” Geophysical Research Letters 41, no. 22 (November 25, 2014): 7763–7769. © 2014 American Geophysical Union
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Understanding the cooling effect of recent volcanoes is of particular interest in the context of the post-2000 slowing of the rate of global warming. Satellite observations of aerosol optical depth above 15 km have demonstrated that small-magnitude volcanic eruptions substantially perturb incoming solar radiation. Here we use lidar, Aerosol Robotic Network, and balloon-borne observations to provide evidence that currently available satellite databases neglect substantial amounts of volcanic aerosol between the tropopause and 15 km at middle to high latitudes and therefore underestimate total radiative forcing resulting from the recent eruptions. Incorporating these estimates into a simple climate model, we determine the global volcanic aerosol forcing since 2000 to be −0.19 ± 0.09 Wm[superscript −2]. This translates into an estimated global cooling of 0.05 to 0.12°C. We conclude that recent volcanic events are responsible for more post-2000 cooling than is implied by satellite databases that neglect volcanic aerosol effects below 15 km.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
Terms of Use
Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1002/2014gl061541
