The Climate Response to Emissions Reductions Due to COVID-19: Initial Results From CovidMIP

Overview

Journal Geophys Res Lett

Date 2021 Jun 21

PMID 34149115

Citations 15

Authors

Chris D Jones

Jonathan E Hickman

Steven T Rumbold

Jeremy Walton

Robin D Lamboll

Ragnhild B Skeie

Stephanie Fiedler

Piers M Forster

Joeri Rogelj

Manabu Abe

Michael Botzet

Katherine Calvin

Christophe Cassou

Jason N S Cole

Paolo Davini

Makoto Deushi

Martin Dix

John C Fyfe

Nathan P Gillett

Tatiana Ilyina

Michio Kawamiya

Maxwell Kelley

Slava Kharin

Tsuyoshi Koshiro

Hongmei Li

Chloe Mackallah

Wolfgang A Muller

Pierre Nabat

Twan van Noije

Paul Nolan

Rumi Ohgaito

Dirk Olivie

Naga Oshima

Jose Parodi

Thomas J Reerink

Lili Ren

Anastasia Romanou

Roland Seferian

Yongming Tang

Claudia Timmreck

Jerry Tjiputra

Etienne Tourigny

Kostas Tsigaridis

Hailong Wang

Mingxuan Wu

Klaus Wyser

Shuting Yang

Yang Yang

Tilo Ziehn

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Many nations responded to the corona virus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic by restricting travel and other activities during 2020, resulting in temporarily reduced emissions of CO, other greenhouse gases and ozone and aerosol precursors. We present the initial results from a coordinated Intercomparison, CovidMIP, of Earth system model simulations which assess the impact on climate of these emissions reductions. 12 models performed multiple initial-condition ensembles to produce over 300 simulations spanning both initial condition and model structural uncertainty. We find model consensus on reduced aerosol amounts (particularly over southern and eastern Asia) and associated increases in surface shortwave radiation levels. However, any impact on near-surface temperature or rainfall during 2020-2024 is extremely small and is not detectable in this initial analysis. Regional analyses on a finer scale, and closer attention to extremes (especially linked to changes in atmospheric composition and air quality) are required to test the impact of COVID-19-related emission reductions on near-term climate.

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