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The realistic prediction of cloud cover and cloud properties by global climate models (GCMs) is a well-known limiting factor in the accuracy of today's climate predictions. Cloud prediction by GCMs is made difficult by the fact that the scale of cloud variability is often much smaller than the grid resolutions that are computationally available to [...]
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An important energy driver of the Earth-atmosphere system is the radiative exchange at the surface. One of the major influences on the amount of radiative energy reaching the surface is the effect of clouds, which in general tend to
decrease the downwelling shortwave (SW) irradiance and
increase the downwelling longwave (LW) irradiance relative
to the [...]
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A primary component of recent climate change is the radiative forcing caused by the increasing amounts of the radiatively active greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Between 1750 and 2005, the radiative forcing at the top of the atmosphere due to increases in carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and halocarbons has totaled over +2.6 W m-2. [...]
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Low level stratiform liquid water clouds have a significant influence on the earth’s climate due to their strong shortwave radiative forcing. Such clouds cover large regions of the earth’s oceans [Klein and Hartmann 1993]. The shortwave optical depth of liquid water clouds depends upon both the bulk condensate amount and the size of the cloud [...]
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