CISA

Finished ProjectsCISA

CISA: Climate Implications of the Sun transition to high Activity mode

Overview

Overview

The CISA project (Climate Implications of the Sun transition to high Activity mode) aimed to evaluate the response of the terrestrial climate and ozone layer state to the high magnetic activity of the Sun.

The evaluation of the possible consequences of the active Sun can be performed only with a fully interactive ocean-atmosphere-chemistry climate model. In the CISA project, we use our recently developed Earth System model SOCOLv4.0 to simulate climate response to the spectral solar irradiance (SSI) changes during the transition of the Sun to high activity mode. Necessary SSI calculations will be provided by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPSS). The computer time for the intended calculations with the climate model will be provided by MPSS and Georg-August-Universität Göttingen. The project is unique due to very new and interesting questions to be addressed and the participation of the world-leading experts in solar irradiance and climate system modeling.

The Project Team

PI Dr. Eugene Rozanov, PMOD/WRC

Scientist Dr. Ttiana Egorova, PMOD/WRC

Scientist Dr. Anna Shapiro, MPS, Goettingen

Scientist Dr. Alexander Shapiro, MPS, Goettingen

 

Specific Objectives

  1. Prepare several scenarios for the SSI changes during the transition of the Sun to more active or passive states;
  2. Simulate the Earth’s global climate and ozone layer changes caused by the suggested Sun transition;
  3. Evaluate the climate response of the SSI perturbations in different spectral areas.
  4. Propose an international model intercomparison project for the SCOSTEP PRESTO Pillar 3 activity.

Methods

The proposed project is based on the hypothesis that state-of-the-art Earth’s system models can properly simulate climate and ozone layer response to solar irradiance variability. For this project, we will simulate climate and ozone layer response to solar irradiance variability using ESM SOCOLv4.0 in ensemble mode. It will allow us to characterize the magnitude and statistical significance of the spectral solar irradiance impact. To understand the obtained results we will exploit several potential scenarios of the spectral solar irradiance using the entire spectral range as well as a combination of different spectral bands responsible for the behavior of the stratosphere (UV irradiance shorter 320 nm) and the Earth’s surface (from 320 to 4000 nm).

Relevance and impact

The project is based on a synergy between extensive solar irradiance and Earth’s climate modeling efforts. The project will help to understand potential ranges of the Earth’s climate and ozone layer variability on very long-time scales. The project will allow expansion of Switzerland’s participation in international assessments and activities (such as SCOSTEP and SPARC) aimed at the study of the solar influence on climate. Some of our results will be used for different international assessments.

SOCOL Model

SOCOL Model Description

Our group studies climate and ozone layer changes caused by different natural and anthropogenic forcing agents using numerical models. Since 2001, we have been working on the development and application of the chemistry-climate model SOCOL (SOlar-Climate-Ozone Links); this is now our main modelling tool. We completed our third version of the model, with improved representation of gas transport, in 2013 (Stenke et al., 2013). Since then, version three of the model has undergone further improvements, such as the addition of VOC (volatile organic compounds) chemistry and interactive lightning parameterization, which allowed the role of the natural and anthropogenic emissions of ozone destroying substances to be characterised for 21st century tropospheric and stratospheric ozone budgets (Revell et al., 2015). We have also evaluated and upgraded the heating rate parameterization (Sukhodolov et al., 2014), the photolysis rate parameterization (Sukhodolov et al., 2016), and the parameterizations of energetic particle effects (Sukhodolov et al., 2017; Arsenovic et al., 2016), which together lead to a more accurate representation of solar-induced climate effects important for future climate projections that consider a potential decrease in future solar activity. In close collaboration with the Institute for Atmosphere and Climate Sciences (IAC) ETHZ, Bern University, and the Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research we have added the ocean/sea-ice dynamics model developed at the Max-Plank Institute for Meteorology (MPIMet, Hamburg, Germany).

The performance of the atmosphere-ocean-chemistry-climate model (AOCCM) SOCOL-MPIOM in simulating past climate has been evaluated and documented in the framework of the SNF Sinergia project FUPSOL (Muthers et al., 2014). In the framework of the SNF project IASSA, we have extended the model by adding the Sulfur group to gas phase chemistry and aerosol microphysics. The performance of the new aerosol-chemistry-climate model (ACCM) SOCOL-AER was documented for background and high aerosol loading conditions (Sheng et al., 2015; Sukhodolov et al., 2018). Since 2016 we have improved the treatment of water uptake by sulfate aerosol particles, aerosol mass conservation, dry and wet deposition schemes, as well as revised the sulfur emissions.

For the next step, it was necessary to combine multiple model versions and add the possibility to consider multiple feedbacks in the Earth system. To do this we have developed the fourth version of the model in the framework of SNF project VEC. It is based on the combination of the MPIMET (Hamburg, Germany) Earth System model (Giorgetta et al., 2013) consisting of ECHAM6 for atmosphere and MPIOM for ocean as well as JSBACH for terrestrial biosphere and HAMOCC for the ocean´s biogeochemistry, with the latest versions of chemical (MEZON) and microphysical (AER) modules used in SOCOLv3.

We have just now completed operational testing on the next-generation of SOCOLv4. Figure 1 illustrates the components and information flow in the ocean-atmosphere-aerosol-chemistry-climate-system-model SOCOLv4. The model treats majority of the processes responsible for the behavior of the ozone layer from the ground up to the mesopause. In addition to the interactive gas-phase/heterogeneous chemistry and bin-resolved stratospheric sulfate aerosol the model can simulate the dynamical vegetation, carbon cycle, emission of sulfur containing species from the ocean and other necessary quantities to simulate direct forcing and feedbacks responsible for the ozone layer behavior. Figure 2 shows altitude-latitude ozone and sulfate aerosol distributions calculated with SOCOLv4. Model already produces realistic ozone and aerosol layers and now undergoes a process of tuning and verification in frames of the SNSF project VEC. By the end of 2018, the model can be applied for the proposed project.

Figure 1. Components and information flow in the Ocean-Atmosphere-Aerosol-Chemistry-Climate Model SOCOLv4.

Figure 2. Zonal mean ozone (left panel) and H2SO4 in liquid phase (right panel) mixing ratios for January 2000 calculated with SOCOLv4.

References

Arsenovic, P., E. Rozanov, J. Anet, A. Stenke, T. Peter, Implications of potential future grand solar minimum for ozone layer and climate, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 18, 3469–3483, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-3469-2018, 2018.
Giorgetta, M., Jungclaus, J., Reick, C. H., et al., Climate and carbon cycle changes from 1850–2100 in MPI‐ESM simulations for the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5. Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems, 5(3), 572–597, https://doi.org/10.1002/jame.20038, 2013.
Muthers, S., J. G. Anet, A. Stenke, C. C. Raible, E. Rozanov, S. Brönnimann, T. Peter, F. X. Arfeuille, A. I. Shapiro, J. Beer, F. Steinhilber, Y. Brugnara, and W. Schmutz, The coupled atmosphere–chemistry–ocean model SOCOL-MPIOM, Geosci. Model Dev., 7, 2157–2179, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-7-2157-2014, 2014.
Revell, L., F. Tummon, A. Stenke, T. Sukhodolov, A. Coulon, E. Rozanov, H. Garny, V. Grewe, and T. Peter, Drivers of the tropospheric ozone budget throughout the 21st century under the medium-high climate scenario RCP 6.0, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 15, 5887–5902, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-5887-2015, 2015.
Sheng, J.-X., Weisenstein, D. K., Luo, et al., Global atmospheric sulfur budget under volcanically quiescent conditions: Aerosol-chemistry-climate model predictions and validation, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 120, 256–276, https://doi.org/10.1002/2014JD021985, 2015.
Sukhodolov, T, E. Rozanov, A. I. Shapiro, J. Anet, C. Cagnazzo, T. Peter, and W. Schmutz, Evaluation of the ECHAM family radiation codes performance in the representation of the solar signal, Geosci. Model Dev., 7, 2859–2866, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-7-2859-2014, 2014.
Sukhodolov, T., E. Rozanov, W. Ball, et al., Evaluation of simulated photolysis rates and their response to solar irradiance variability, J. Geophys. Res. Atmos., 121, https://doi.org/10.1002/ 2015JD024277, 2016.
Sukhodolov, T., Usoskin, I., Rozanov, et al., Atmospheric impacts of the strongest known solar particle storm of 775 AD, in Scientific Reports, 7, 45257-45257, https://doi.org/10.1038/srep45257, 2017.
Sukhodolov, T., J.-X. Sheng, A. Feinberg, et al., Size-Resolved Stratospheric Aerosol Distributions after Pinatubo Derived from a Coupled Aerosol-Chemistry-Climate Model, Geosci. Model Dev. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-2017-326, under review, 2018.
Stenke, A., Schraner, M., Rozanov, E., Egorova, T., Luo, B., and Peter, T., The SOCOL version 3.0 chemistry-climate model: description, evaluation, and implications from an advanced transport algorithm, Geoscientific Model Development, 6, 1407–1427, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd- 6-1407-2013, 2013.

Numerical experiments

Intended Experiments

For the planned experiments, we will mostly use the standard model version (T63/L47) with all model components switched on. We plan to run the model in ensemble mode for most of the experiments. We plan to run a set of 100-year time-slice ensemble experiments repeating all boundary conditions for the year 2000. All runs will be initiated from the available restart data files for the atmosphere and ocean obtained from the completed experiments with SOCOLv4.0. We intend to run the model for the following scenarios:

  1. Prescribed monthly SSI for the year 2000 (solar activity maximum).
  2. Prescribed monthly SSI for the Sun transition to a more active state.
  3. Prescribed monthly SSI in the spectral area 115-320 nm for the year 2000 and for the transition period in the spectral region 320-4000 nm.
  4. Prescribed monthly SSI in the spectral region 115-320 nm for the transition period and for the year 2000 in the spectral region 320-4000 nm.

References

Shapiro, A. I., Amazo-Gómez, E. M.,Krivova, N. A., & Solanki, S. K., Astron. Astrophys, 633, A32, 2020.
Shapiro, A.I. et al., Nat. Astron., 1, 612–616, 2017.

Time schedule

CISA Time Schedule

Time               Activity Staff involved
Month 1-2 Model installation on MPISS computers. Execution of the test run.

E. Rozanov

T. Egorova
Month 1-2 Calculations of the SSI for the year 2000 and transition period

A.V. Shapiro

A.I. Shapiro
Month 3-10 Execute model runs 1 and 2.

E. Rozanov

T. Egorova
Month 6-10 Analysis of the results.

E. Rozanov

T. Egorova

A.V. Shapiro

A.I. Shapiro

L. Gizon
Month 11-12

·        Paper preparation.

 

E. Rozanov

T. Egorova

A.V. Shapiro

A.I. Shapiro
Milestone A ·        The manuscriptss with the description of the model runs 1-2 is ready
Month 13-20 ·        Execute model runs 3 and 4. T. Egorova
Month 16-20 ·        Analysis of the results.

E. Rozanov

T. Egorova

A.V. Shapiro

A.I. Shapiro

L. Gizon
Month 21-24

·        Papers preparation. Preparation of the proposal for the international model intercomparison project.

·

 All team

Numbers of the numerical experiments here correspond to those in the “Numerical experiments” inset.

Useful links

Useful links

SCOSTEP:

The Scientific Committee on Solar-Terrestrial Physics (SCOSTEP) runs international interdisciplinary scientific programs and promotes solar-terrestrial physics research by providing the necessary scientific framework for international collaboration and dissemination of the derived scientific knowledge in collaboration with other ISC bodies. (https://scostep.org).

PRESTO:

Predictability of the Solar-Terrestrial Coupling (PRESTO) is a science program that seeks to improve the predictability of energy flow in the integrated Sun-Earth system on times scales from a few hours to centuries through promoting international collaborative efforts. PRESTO is sponsored by SCOSTEP, the Scientific Committee on Solar Terrestrial Physics.to constrain and improve interactive stratospheric aerosol models and reduce uncertainties in the stratospheric aerosol forcing by comparing results of standardised model experiments with a range of observations ( https://scostep.org/presto/).

 

 

News

News List

05.01.2021 – project CISA has started 🙂 Good luck to all collaborators!

31.12.2022 – project CISA has finished. The final report can be downloaded here →

06.02.2023 – first project paper “Climate implications of the Sun transition to higher activity mode” appears online at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364682623000184

??.03.2023 – we plan to submit a second project paper, details will follow.

For further information please contact: Dr. E. Rozanov, Dr. T. Egorova (CISA editor)