Climate forcings in the industrial era

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1998 Oct 27;95(22):12753-8. doi: 10.1073/pnas.95.22.12753.

Abstract

The forcings that drive long-term climate change are not known with an accuracy sufficient to define future climate change. Anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs), which are well measured, cause a strong positive (warming) forcing. But other, poorly measured, anthropogenic forcings, especially changes of atmospheric aerosols, clouds, and land-use patterns, cause a negative forcing that tends to offset greenhouse warming. One consequence of this partial balance is that the natural forcing due to solar irradiance changes may play a larger role in long-term climate change than inferred from comparison with GHGs alone. Current trends in GHG climate forcings are smaller than in popular "business as usual" or 1% per year CO2 growth scenarios. The summary implication is a paradigm change for long-term climate projections: uncertainties in climate forcings have supplanted global climate sensitivity as the predominant issue.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Climate*
  • Environmental Pollution
  • Gases / adverse effects
  • Greenhouse Effect*
  • Humans
  • Industry*

Substances

  • Gases