Small global-mean cooling due to volcanic radiative forcing

Abstract

In both the observational record and atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) simulations of the last ∼ 150 years, short-lived negative radiative forcing due to volcanic aerosol, following explosive eruptions, causes sudden global-mean cooling of up to ∼ 0.3 K. This is about five times smaller than expected from the transient climate response parameter (TCRP, K of global-mean surface air temperature change per W m−2 of radiative forcing increase) evaluated under atmospheric CO2 concentration increasing at 1 % yr−1. Using the step model (Good et al. in Geophys Res Lett 38:L01703, 2011. doi:10.1029/2010GL045208), we confirm the previous finding (Held et al. in J Clim 23:2418–2427, 2010. doi:10.1175/2009JCLI3466.1) that the main reason for the discrepancy is the damping of the response to short-lived forcing by the thermal inertia of the upper ocean. Although the step model includes this effect, it still overestimates the volcanic cooling simulated by AOGCMs by about 60 %. We show that this remaining discrepancy can be explained by the magnitude of the volcanic forcing, which may be smaller in AOGCMs (by 30 % for the HadCM3 AOGCM) than in off-line calculations that do not account for rapid cloud adjustment, and the climate sensitivity parameter, which may be smaller than for increasing CO2 (40 % smaller than for 4 × CO2 in HadCM3).