Impact of Geoengineering Schemes on the Global Hydrological Cycle Metadata

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Title

  • Main Title Impact of Geoengineering Schemes on the Global Hydrological Cycle

Creator

  • Author: Bala, G.
    Creator Type: Personal
  • Author: Duffy, P.
    Creator Type: Personal
  • Author: Taylor, K.
    Creator Type: Personal

Contributor

  • Sponsor: United States. Department of Energy.
    Contributor Type: Organization

Publisher

  • Name: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    Place of Publication: Livermore, California
    Additional Info: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA

Date

  • Creation: 2007-12-07

Language

  • English

Description

  • Content Description: The rapidly rising CO{sub 2} level in the atmosphere has led to proposals of climate stabilization via 'Geoengineering' schemes that would mitigate climate change by intentionally reducing the solar radiation incident on earth's surface. In this paper, we address the impact of these climate stabilization schemes on the global hydrological cycle, using equilibrium simulations from an atmospheric general circulation model coupled to a slab ocean model. We show that insolation reductions sufficient to offset global-scale temperature increases lead to a decrease in the intensity of the global hydrologic cycle. This occurs because solar forcing is more effective in driving changes in global mean evaporation than is CO{sub 2} forcing of a similar magnitude. In the model used here, the hydrologic sensitivity, defined as the percentage change in global mean precipitation per degree warming, is 2.4% for solar forcing, but only 1.5% for CO{sub 2} forcing. Although other models and the climate system itself may differ quantitatively from this result, the conclusion can be understood based on simple considerations of the surface energy budget and thus is likely to be robust. Compared to changing temperature by altering greenhouse gas concentrations, changing temperature by varying insolation results in larger changes in net radiative fluxes at the surface; these are compensated by larger changes in latent and sensible heat fluxes. Hence the hydrological cycle is more sensitive to temperature adjustment via changes in insolation than changes in greenhouse gases. This implies that an alteration in solar forcing might offset temperature changes or hydrological changes from greenhouse warming, but could not cancel both at once.
  • Physical Description: PDF-file: 20 pages; size: 0.3 Mbytes

Subject

  • Keyword: Sensitivity
  • Keyword: Surface Energy
  • Keyword: Stabilization
  • Keyword: Evaporation
  • Keyword: General Circulation Models
  • Keyword: Greenhouse Gases
  • STI Subject Categories: 58 Geosciences
  • Keyword: Climates
  • STI Subject Categories: 54 Environmental Sciences
  • Keyword: Precipitation
  • Keyword: Solar Radiation
  • Keyword: Insolation

Source

  • Journal Name: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 105, no. 22, August 5, 2008, pp. 7664-7669; Journal Volume: 105; Journal Issue: 22

Collection

  • Name: Office of Scientific & Technical Information Technical Reports
    Code: OSTI

Institution

  • Name: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department
    Code: UNTGD

Resource Type

  • Article

Format

  • Text

Identifier

  • Report No.: UCRL-JRNL-237159
  • Grant Number: W-7405-ENG-48
  • Office of Scientific & Technical Information Report Number: 943811
  • Archival Resource Key: ark:/67531/metadc900130
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