Climate sensitivity and cloud response of a GCM with a superparameterization

Abstract

The climate sensitivity of an atmospheric GCM that uses a cloud-resolving model as a convective superparameterization is analyzed by comparing simulations with specified climatological sea surface temperature (SST) and with the SST increased by 2 K. The model has weaker climate sensitivity than most GCMs, but comparable climate sensitivity to recent aqua-planet simulations of a global cloud-resolving model. The weak sensitivity is primarily due to an increase in low cloud fraction and liquid water in tropical regions of moderate subsidence as well as substantial increases in high-latitude cloud fraction. Copyright 2006 by the American Geophysical Union.