Cloud Loss Could Add 8 Degrees to Global Warming

[OKIsItJustMe]

3. Earth could warm by 14C as growing emissions destroy crucial clouds

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2194781-earth-could-warm-by-14c-as-growing-emissions-destroy-crucial-clouds/

Earth could warm by 14°C as growing emissions destroy crucial clouds
25 February 2019

By Michael Le Page

If we keep burning fossil fuels with reckless abandon, we could trigger a cloud feedback effect that will add 8°C on top of all the warming up to that point. That means the world could warm by more than 14°C above the pre-industrial level.

Needless to say, this would be cataclysmic. For instance, large parts of the tropics would become too hot for warm-blooded animals, including us, to survive.

The good news is that if countries step up their efforts to cut emissions we should avoid finding out if this idea is correct. “I don’t think we will get anywhere close to it,” says Tapio Schneider at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, who led the research.

Schneider’s team modelled stratocumulus clouds over subtropical oceans, which cover around 7 per cent of Earth’s surface and cool the planet by reflecting the sun’s heat back into space. They found there was a sudden transition when CO2 levels reached around 1200 parts per million (ppm) — the stratocumulus clouds broke up and disappeared.

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https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-019-0310-1