Journal article
Uncertainties in CMIP5 climate projections due to carbon cycle feedbacks
P Friedlingstein, M Meinshausen, VK Arora, CD Jones, A Anav, SK Liddicoat, R Knutti
Journal of Climate | Published : 2014
Abstract
In the context of phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project, most climate simulations use prescribed atmospheric CO2 concentration and therefore do not interactively include the effect of carbon cycle feedbacks. However, the representative concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) scenario has additionally been run by earth system models with prescribed CO2 emissions. This paper analyzes the climate projections of 11 earth system models (ESMs) that performed both emission-driven and concentration-driven RCP8.5 simulations.When forced by RCP8.5 CO2 emissions, models simulate a large spread in atmospheric CO2; the simulated 2100 concentrations range between 795 and 1145 ppm. Seven out of t..
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Awarded by European Commission
Funding Acknowledgements
We acknowledge the World Climate Research Programme's Working Group on Coupled Modelling, which is responsible for CMIP, and we thank the climate modeling groups (listed in Table 1 of this paper) for producing and making available their model output. For CMIP, the U.S. Department of Energy's Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison provides coordinating support and led development of software infrastructure in partnership with the Global Organization for Earth System Science Portals. PF and AA acknowledge the GREENCYCLESII, COMBINE, and EMBRACE EU/FP7 projects. CDJ and SKL were supported by the Joint DECC/Defra Met Office Hadley Centre Climate Programme (GA01101).