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Ice Melt, Sea Level Rise and Superstorms: Evidence from Paleoclimate Data, Climate Modeling, and Modern Observations that 2C Global Warming Could Be DangerousWe use numerical climate simulations, paleoclimate data, and modern observations to study the effect of growing ice melt from Antarctica and Greenland. Meltwater tends to stabilize the ocean column, inducing amplifying feedbacks that increase subsurface ocean warming and ice shelf melting. Cold meltwater and induced dynamical effects cause ocean surface cooling in the Southern Ocean and North Atlantic, thus increasing Earth's energy imbalance and heat flux into most of the global ocean's surface. Southern Ocean surface cooling, while lower latitudes are warming, increases precipitation on the Southern Ocean, increasing ocean stratification, slowing deepwater formation, and increasing ice sheet mass loss. These feedbacks make ice sheets in contact with the ocean vulnerable to accelerating disintegration. We hypothesize that ice mass loss from the most vulnerable ice, sufficient to raise sea level several meters, is better approximated as exponential than by a more linear response. Doubling times of 10, 20 or 40 years yield multi-meter sea level rise in about 50, 100 or 200 years. Recent ice melt doubling times are near the lower end of the 10-40-year range, but the record is too short to confirm the nature of the response. The feedbacks, including subsurface ocean warming, help explain paleoclimate data and point to a dominant Southern Ocean role in controlling atmospheric CO2, which in turn exercised tight control on global temperature and sea level. The millennial (500-2000-year) timescale of deep-ocean ventilation affects the timescale for natural CO2 change and thus the timescale for paleo-global climate, ice sheet, and sea level changes, but this paleo-millennial timescale should not be misinterpreted as the timescale for ice sheet response to a rapid, large, human-made climate forcing. These climate feedbacks aid interpretation of events late in the prior interglacial, when sea level rose to C6-9m with evidence of extreme storms while Earth was less than 1 C warmer than today. Ice melt cooling of the North Atlantic and Southern oceans increases atmospheric temperature gradients, eddy kinetic energy and baroclinicity, thus driving more powerful storms. The modeling, paleoclimate evidence, and ongoing observations together imply that 2 C global warming above the preindustrial level could be dangerous. Continued high fossil fuel emissions this century are predicted to yield (1) cooling of the Southern Ocean, especially in the Western Hemisphere; (2) slowing of the Southern Ocean overturning circulation, warming of the ice shelves, and growing ice sheet mass loss; (3) slowdown and eventual shutdown of the Atlantic overturning circulation with cooling of the North Atlantic region; (4) increasingly powerful storms; and (5) nonlinearly growing sea level rise, reaching several meters over a timescale of 50-150 years. These predictions, especially the cooling in the Southern Ocean and North Atlantic with markedly reduced warming or even cooling in Europe, differ fundamentally from existing climate change assessments. We discuss observations and modeling studies needed to refute or clarify these assertions.
Document ID
20160004059
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Hansen, J.
(Columbia Univ. New York, NY, United States)
Sato, Makiko
(Columbia Univ. New York, NY, United States)
Hearty, Paul
(North Carolina Univ. Wilmington, NC, United States)
Ruedy, Reto
(TRINNOVIM, LLC New York, NY, United States)
Kelley, Maxwell
(TRINNOVIM, LLC New York, NY, United States)
Masson-Delmotte, Valerie
(Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL) France)
Russell, Gary
(NASA Goddard Inst. for Space Studies New York, NY, United States)
Tselioudis, George
(NASA Goddard Inst. for Space Studies New York, NY, United States)
Cao, Junji
(Academia Sinica Beijing, China)
Rignot, Eric
(California Univ. Irvine, CA, United States)
Velicogna, Isabella
(California Univ. Irvine, CA, United States)
Tormey, Blair
(University of Western Carolina Cullowhee, NC, United States)
Donovan, Bailey
(East Carolina Univ. Greenville, NC, United States)
Kandiano, Evgeniya
(GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany)
von Schuckmann, Karina
(Toulon Univ. La Garde, France)
Kharecha, Pushker
(Columbia Univ. New York, NY, United States)
Legrande, Allegra N.
(NASA Goddard Inst. for Space Studies New York, NY, United States)
Bauer, Michael
(Columbia Univ. New York, NY, United States)
Lo, Kwok-Wai
(TRINNOVIM, LLC New York, NY, United States)
Date Acquired
March 29, 2016
Publication Date
March 22, 2016
Publication Information
Publication: Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Publisher: Copernicus
Volume: 16
Issue: 6
Subject Category
Meteorology And Climatology
Report/Patent Number
GSFC-E-DAA-TN25639
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NNG12HP07C
CONTRACT_GRANT: NNX14AB99A
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other
Keywords
Computer simulation
Oceans
Global warming
Storms
Sea level
Ice

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