@article{ac18cad3e5c14f3b9e6e73f95da5370f,
title = "What causes the spread of model projections of ocean dynamic sea-level change in response to greenhouse gas forcing?",
abstract = "Sea levels of different atmosphere–ocean general circulation models (AOGCMs) respond to climate change forcing in different ways, representing a crucial uncertainty in climate change research. We isolate the role of the ocean dynamics in setting the spatial pattern of dynamic sea-level (ζ) change by forcing several AOGCMs with prescribed identical heat, momentum (wind) and freshwater flux perturbations. This method produces a ζ projection spread comparable in magnitude to the spread that results from greenhouse gas forcing, indicating that the differences in ocean model formulation are the cause, rather than diversity in surface flux change. The heat flux change drives most of the global pattern of ζ change, while the momentum and water flux changes cause locally confined features. North Atlantic heat uptake causes large temperature and salinity driven density changes, altering local ocean transport and ζ. The spread between AOGCMs here is caused largely by differences in their regional transport adjustment, which redistributes heat that was already in the ocean prior to perturbation. The geographic details of the ζ change in the North Atlantic are diverse across models, but the underlying dynamic change is similar. In contrast, the heat absorbed by the Southern Ocean does not strongly alter the vertically coherent circulation. The Arctic ζ change is dissimilar across models, owing to differences in passive heat uptake and circulation change. Only the Arctic is strongly affected by nonlinear interactions between the three air-sea flux changes, and these are model specific.",
keywords = "Climate change, Climate modeling, Ocean heat uptake, Sea-level rise",
author = "Couldrey, {Matthew P.} and Gregory, {Jonathan M.} and {Boeira Dias}, Fabio and Peter Dobrohotoff and Domingues, {Catia M.} and Oluwayemi Garuba and Griffies, {Stephen M.} and Helmuth Haak and Aixue Hu and Masayoshi Ishii and Johann Jungclaus and Armin K{\"o}hl and Marsland, {Simon J.} and Sayantani Ojha and Saenko, {Oleg A.} and Abhishek Savita and Andrew Shao and Detlef Stammer and Tatsuo Suzuki and Alexander Todd and Laure Zanna",
note = "Funding Information: We acknowledge the World Climate Research Programme's Working Group on Coupled Modelling, which is responsible for CMIP, and we thank the climate modelling groups for producing and making available their model output. We thank the Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) for archiving the data and providing access, and the multiple funding agencies who support CMIP6 and ESGF. This work was supported in part by grant NE/R000727/1 from the UK Natural Environment Research Council as a contribution to the WCRP{\textquoteright}s Grand Challenge on Regional Sea Level Change and Coastal Impacts. OG and AH were supported by the Regional and Global Model Analysis (RGMA) component of the Earth and Environmental System Modeling (EESM) program of the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science Biological and Environmental Research (BER), as a contribution to the HiLAT-RASM and CATALYST projects. OG also acknowledges helpful discussions with Phil Rasch. Contributions from JJ, AK, SO and DS were supported in part through the Deutsche Forschungs Gemeinschaft (DFG) as part of the SPP 1889 on “Regional sea level change and society”. ACCESS-CM2 simulations were supported by NCMAS and NCI-STRESS2020 grants through the National Computing Infrastructure National Facility at the Australian National University. FBD and A. Savita were supported by a Tasmanian Graduate Research Scholarship and CSIRO-UTAS Quantitative Marine Science top-up. A. Savita, SJM and PD were supported by projects jointly funded through CSIRO and the Earth Systems and Climate Change Hub of the Australian Government{\textquoteright}s National Environmental Science Programme. CMD was supported by the Australian Research Council (FT130101532 and DP160103130) and UK{\textquoteright}s Natural Environment Research Council (NE/P019293/1). A. Savita, FBD, PD,SJM, CMD are thankful for the support from the Consortium for Ocean-Sea Ice Modelling in Australia (COSIMA). TS and MI were supported by the Integrated Research Program for Advancing Climate Models (TOUGOU) Grant Number JPMXD0717935457 and JPMXD0717935561 the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan, respectively. A. Shao was supported by the Marine Environmental Observation Prediction & Response (MEOPAR) network. This work was supported by grant ly62 from the National Computational Infrastructure. Funding Information: We acknowledge the World Climate Research Programme's Working Group on Coupled Modelling, which is responsible for CMIP, and we thank the climate modelling groups for producing and making available their model output. We thank the Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) for archiving the data and providing access, and the multiple funding agencies who support CMIP6 and ESGF. This work was supported in part by grant NE/R000727/1 from the UK Natural Environment Research Council as a contribution to the WCRP?s Grand Challenge on Regional Sea Level Change and Coastal Impacts. OG and AH were supported by the Regional and Global Model Analysis (RGMA) component of the Earth and Environmental System Modeling (EESM) program of the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science Biological and Environmental Research (BER), as a contribution to the HiLAT-RASM and CATALYST projects. OG also acknowledges helpful discussions with Phil Rasch. Contributions from JJ, AK, SO and DS were supported in part through the Deutsche Forschungs Gemeinschaft (DFG) as part of the SPP 1889 on ?Regional sea level change and society?. ACCESS-CM2 simulations were supported by NCMAS and NCI-STRESS2020 grants through the National Computing Infrastructure National Facility at the Australian National University. FBD and A. Savita were supported by a Tasmanian Graduate Research Scholarship and CSIRO-UTAS Quantitative Marine Science top-up. A. Savita, SJM and PD were supported by projects jointly funded through CSIRO and the Earth Systems and Climate Change Hub of the Australian Government?s?National Environmental Science Programme. CMD was supported by the Australian Research Council (FT130101532 and DP160103130) and UK?s Natural Environment Research Council (NE/P019293/1). A. Savita, FBD, PD,SJM, CMD are thankful for the support from the Consortium for Ocean-Sea Ice Modelling in Australia (COSIMA). TS and MI were supported by the Integrated Research Program for Advancing Climate Models (TOUGOU) Grant Number JPMXD0717935457 and JPMXD0717935561 the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan, respectively. A. Shao was supported by the Marine Environmental Observation Prediction & Response (MEOPAR) network. This work was supported by grant ly62 from the National Computational Infrastructure. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2020, The Author(s).",
year = "2021",
month = jan,
doi = "10.1007/s00382-020-05471-4",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "56",
pages = "155--187",
journal = "Climate Dynamics",
issn = "0930-7575",
publisher = "Springer Verlag",
number = "1-2",
}