Ballinger et al. (2025) Importance of beginning industrial-era climate simulations in the eighteenth century

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Environmental Research Letters
• Year: 2025
• Date: 2025-11-05
• Authors: Andrew Ballinger, Andrew Schurer, Gabriele C. Hegerl, Andrea J. Dittus, Ed Hawkins, Richard Cornes, Elizabeth C. Kent, Lauren Marshall, Colin Morice, Timothy J. Osborn, Nick A Rayner, Steven T. Rumbold
• DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/ae1bbc

Research Groups

Researchers utilizing the UK Earth System Model (UKESM1.1) and the GloSATref dataset.

Short Summary

This study investigates early industrial climate changes (1750-1850) using Earth system model simulations, demonstrating that initializing simulations in 1750, rather than 1850, leads to more representative historical climate simulations with lasting effects into the 20th century due to better capture of early human influence and volcanic activity.

Objective

• To investigate climatic changes during the early industrial period (1750-1850), separating the effects of natural and anthropogenic forcings.
• To determine if an earlier start to historical climate simulations (1750 vs. 1850) leads to more representative climate simulations over the historical period and deepens the understanding of early anthropogenic warming, natural climate variability, and climate responses to future volcanic eruptions.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Global, with specific mention of low latitudes.
• Temporal Scale: 1750 onwards, spanning the entire industrial period, with analysis of early 19th century and lasting effects into the 20th century.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: UKESM1.1 (Earth system model).
• Data sources: GloSATref (new instrumental observation-based dataset providing global surface air temperature variations from 1781 onwards).

Main Results

• Model-simulated early 19th-century temperature patterns show substantial cooling relative to the long-term mean, particularly in low latitudes, which aligns well with observed patterns from GloSATref.
• Significant long-term differences were found between simulations initialized in 1750 and 1850, with these effects persisting well into the 20th century.
• These differences are consistent with variations in vegetation and substantial ocean cooling driven by high volcanic activity captured in the 1750-initialized simulations.

Contributions

• Provides a novel comparison of Earth system model simulations initialized in 1750 against a new instrumental observation-based dataset (GloSATref).
• Demonstrates the critical importance of an earlier start date (1750) for historical climate simulations to achieve more representative outcomes over the entire industrial period.
• Enhances understanding of early anthropogenic warming, natural climate variability, and the long-term climate responses to volcanic eruptions by better accounting for pre-1850 forcings.

Funding

Not specified in the abstract.

Citation

@article{Ballinger2025Importance,
  author = {Ballinger, Andrew and Schurer, Andrew and Hegerl, Gabriele C. and Dittus, Andrea J. and Hawkins, Ed and Cornes, Richard and Kent, Elizabeth C. and Marshall, Lauren and Morice, Colin and Osborn, Timothy J. and Rayner, Nick A and Rumbold, Steven T.},
  title = {Importance of beginning industrial-era climate simulations in the eighteenth century},
  journal = {Environmental Research Letters},
  year = {2025},
  doi = {10.1088/1748-9326/ae1bbc},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ae1bbc}
}