Human Induced Climate Change: The IPCC Fourth Assessment

1. Human Induced Climate Change: The IPCC Fourth Assessment AKE-Programme Annual Conference the German Physical Society (DPG) Regensberg, March 26-27 2007 Bill Hare, Visiting Scientist, PIK

2. IPCC AR4 - Physical Science report in context • Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis • Accepted Paris, Feb 2007 • Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability • Under final government review, to be adopted Brussels, April 2-5. 2007 • Climate Change 2007: Mitigation of Climate Change • Under final government review, to be adopted Bangkok, April 30-3 May 2007 • AR4 Synthesis Report • Under preparation, final government review begins May 15, 2007 and report to be adopted in Valencia, November 2007

3. Overview • Context of IPCC AR4 • Unless otherwise stated figures are from IPCC Summary for Policy Makers and/or Chapters wuth references in notes to slides. • SPM = refers to Summary for Policy Makers • TS = Technical Summary and numbers eg Fig X.Y refer to Chapters and figure number • Projections • Emissions to climate response • Uncertainty in climate sensitivity • Global and regional projections • Coupled carbon cycle • Perspective on AR4 sea level rise projections • Beyond 21st century climate change

4. Emissions to climate response Improved understanding global and regional climate system response to forcing Improved understanding of coupled carbon cycle climate interactions Improved understanding of gas cycles Improved understanding radiative forcing due to gases, aerosols, land use change, volcanic activities and solar cycles Figure 10.1.

5. Radiative forcing - response • Energy balance of the perturbed climate system Radiative forcing at the top of troposphere Surface temperature change Total global mean feedback parameter Total heat content perturbation of the ocean • Climate sensitivity defined at equilibrium for a radiative forcing equivalent to a doubling of CO2 concentrations

6. Improved understanding of radiative forcing • The understanding of anthropogenic warming and cooling influences on climate has improved since the Third Assessment Report (TAR) • Very high confidence that the globally averaged net effect of human activities since 1750 has been one of warming, with a radiative forcing of +1.6 [+0.6 to+2.4] W m-2.

7. Radiative forcing of the climate system FIGURE SPM-2. Global-average radiative forcing

8. Climate sensitivity • Global mean warming at equilibrium for a radiative forcing equivalent to a doubling of CO2 concentration • Likely: 2 to 4.5°C • Likelihood range for first time • Best estimate: 3°C • Best estimate in 1990 and 1995 was 2.5°C • Very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C. • Values higher than 4.5°C cannot be excluded • Cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty.

9. Uncertainty in climate sensitivity Box 10.2, Figure 1

10. Improved climate change projections • Large number of simulations available from a broader range of models. • Quantitative basis for estimating likelihoods for many aspects of future climate change. • Comparison with projections since 1990 strengthens confidence in near-term projections. • Next two decades warming of about 0.2°C per decade is projected for range of SRES emission scenarios. • Even if the concentrations of all greenhouse gases and aerosols had been kept constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming of about 0.1°C per decade would be expected. • Comment: Caveat on sea level rise projections

11. IPCC Projections vs observations Figure TS-26. Model projections of global mean warming

12. Ranges of surface warming to 2100

13. AOGCM projections of surface temperature FIGURE SPM-6. Projected surface temperature changes for

14. Sea Ice Changes Figure 10.13. Multi model simulated anomalies in sea ice extent

15. Precipitation projections FIGURE SPM-7.

16. North America snow Figure 11.13. Percent snow depth changes in March

17. Changes in extremes

18. Projections of extreme weather events

19. Projected changes in extremes

20. Frosts, heatwaves, growing season

21. Regional projections • There is now higher confidence in projected patterns of warming and other regional-scale features, including changes in wind patterns, precipitation, and some aspects of extremes and of ice.

22. Regional changes Temperature anomalies with respect to 1901–1950 for 1906–2005 (black line) and as simulated (red envelope) and as projected for 2001–2100

23. Carbon cycle climate coupling • TAR and AR4: Warming tends to reduce land and ocean uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide, increasing the fraction of anthropogenic emissions that remains in the atmosphere. • Climate carbon cycle coupling is expected to add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere as the climate system warms, but the magnitude of this feedback is uncertain

24. Carbon cycle climate coupling • Stronger assessed climate-carbon cycle feedbacks increases upper range of temperatures • eg IPCC SRES A2 scenario global average warming at 2100 by more than 1°C. • Decreases CO2 emissions required to achieve a particular CO2 stabilisation level • For 450 ppm CO2 stabilization stronger climate-carbon cycle feedbacks reduce cumulative allowed emissions over 21st century be from approximately 670 GtC to approximately 490 GtC

25. Oceanic acidification

26. IPCC sea level projections vs observations Sea level rise trend is at top of IPCC TAR range IPCC TAR SRES range: Land ice (ice sheet) uncertainty range Observations – solid red (tide gauge) and blue (satellite) with non linear trend IPCC TAR SRES range Rahmstorf et al 2007 Science

27. Sea level rise projections

28. Non uniform sea level rise Figure 10.32. Local sea level change (m) due to ocean density and circulation change relative to the global average

29. Sea level rise: Observations vs Models Opposite sign to observations: ice dynamics Within error estimates of sum of contributions 35% of observed SLR unexplained?

30. Total sea level projections 1993-2003 mean trend extrapolated to 2100 Antarctic ice sheet reduces sea level over 21s century Ad Hoc adjustment for ice sheet dynamics not included in models

31. Uncertainty in AR4 sea level rise projections • Models substantially underestimate past SLR • Uncertain implications for future projections but of concern for risk assessment • For both ice sheets recent accelerations in ice flow have contributed significantly to recent SLR but this is not included in the models. • Full AOGCM temperature range with carbon cycle feedback not included • warming up to ca 5oC considered but not 6.4oC • Ice sheet dynamics unable to be modeled at present • Ad Hoc adjustment is just that - Ad Hoc. • VIEWPOINT: Likely that IPCC AR4 sea level rise projections are biased low due to these factors.

32. Beyond the 21st century • Anthropogenic warming and sea level rise would continue for centuries due to the timescales even if greenhouse gas concentrations were to be stabilized. • Inertia in climate system: • Past and future carbon dioxide emissions will continue to contribute to warming and sea level rise for more than a millennium. • Further increase in global average temperature of about 0.5°C • (Radiative forcing stabilized in 2100) • Sea level rise from thermal expansion alone would lead to 0.3 to 0.8 m of sea level rise by 2300 and continue for many centuries • (Radiative forcing stabilized in 2100)

33. WWW.IPCC.CH Not the best web site in the business, but it is all there...

34. The End

35. Additional slides if needed for questions

36. Inertia in the climate system

37. Energy content changes

38. Projected global mean temperature

39. Surface mean temperature change for 2100

40. Probabilistic assessments

41. Uncertainty in climate sensitivity

42. IPCC Assessments 1990-2006

43. Regional changes

44. African changes

45. African precipitation

46. Carbon cycle

47. Thermal SLR commitment

48. Greenland ice sheet