Amplified surface warming in the south-west Pacific during the mid-Pliocene (3.3–3.0 Ma) and future implications

• Published in: Climate of the past Vol. 19; no. 7; pp. 1359 - 1381
• Main Authors: Grant, Georgia R, Williams, Jonny H. T, Naeher, Sebastian, Seki, Osamu, McClymont, Erin L, Patterson, Molly O, Haywood, Alan M, Behrens, Erik, Yamamoto, Masanobu, Johnson, Katelyn
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Katlenburg-Lindau Copernicus GmbH 13.07.2023; Copernicus Publications
• Subjects: Archives; Atmospheric circulation; Atmospheric models; Biomarkers; Carbon dioxide; Climate; Climate change; Climate models; Cores; Deep sea; Deep sea sediments; Earth; Emissions; Equilibrium; Global climate; Global climate models; Global temperatures; Global warming; Glycerin; Glycerol; Heat; Ice sheets; Intercomparison; Interglacial periods; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; Modelling; Ocean circulation; Oceans; Performance evaluation; Pliocene; Regional climates; Sea level; Sea surface temperature; Sediment; Sediments (Geology); Surface temperature; Temperature; Temperature changes; New Zealand; Southern Ocean
• ISSN: 1814-9332; 1814-9324; 1814-9332
• DOI: 10.5194/cp-19-1359-2023

Based on Nationally Determined Contributions concurrent with Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) 2-4.5, the IPCC predicts global warming of 2.1-3.5 .sup." C (very likely range 10-90th percentile) by 2100 CE. However, global average temperature is a poor indicator of regional warming and global climate models (GCMs) require validation with instrumental or proxy data from geological archives to assess their ability to simulate regional ocean and atmospheric circulation, and thus, to evaluate their performance for regional climate projections. The south-west Pacific is a region that performs poorly when GCMs are evaluated against instrumental observations. The New Zealand Earth System Model (NZESM) was developed from the United Kingdom Earth System Model (UKESM) to better understand south-west Pacific response to global change, by including a nested ocean grid in the south-west Pacific with 80 % greater horizontal resolution than the global-scale host.