When clouds loft tropical air masses high into the sky, some of the gases they carry can be transformed into tiny particles, initiating a process that that may end up brightening lower-level clouds and reflecting more sunlight away from Earth. Exactly how much sunlight these clouds reflect has always been a question because of the large, unsampled expanses of atmosphere over the tropical oceans.
Now, in one of the first studies published from the largest and longest airborne chemistry research campaigns ever attempted, a CIRES scientist working at NOAA estimates that this cloud-brightening process could occur over 40 percent of the Earth’s surface - a significant number that calls into question whether climate models are accurately representing clouds’ cooling effect.
The study was published October 16 in the journal Nature.
“Understanding how these particles form and contribute to cloud properties in the tropics will help us better represent clouds in climate models and improve those models,” said lead author Christina Williamson, a CIRES scientist working at NOAA.
Continue reading at NOAA.
Image via NOAA.