Model thermal response to minor radiative energy sources and sinks in the middle atmosphere

Abstract

This paper presents the thermal response of the Canadian middle atmosphere model (CMAM) to minor radiative energy sources and sinks. These include chemical heating, infrared (IR) H2O cooling, sphericity effect in solar heating, and solar heating in the near‐IR CO2 bands. All of these energy sources/sinks can be considered as minor ones either in terms of their magnitude or in terms of the limited height region where they are of importance or both. To examine the thermal response of the middle atmosphere, a version of the CMAM with an interactive gas phase chemistry scheme has been used in a series of multiyear experiments for conditions of perpetual July. Each of the analyzed mechanisms may provide a noticeable contribution into the model energy balance that results in a statistically significant model response. Various forcing terms due to minor energy sources/sinks have different spatial and temporal distributions. Their magnitudes vary from tenths K d−1 for the sphericity effect up to ∼10 K d−1 for chemical heating that provides corresponding thermal responses of a few to about 20 K in the middle atmosphere. The model thermal response depends on the magnitude of the applied forcing but is not always local and can be spread beyond the regions where the forcing terms are initially applied. On a globally averaged basis the local strength of the model response is nearly proportional to the magnitude of the small forcing terms but shows nonlinearity when forcing due to chemical heating exceeds ∼1 K d−1 in the mesosphere. Accounting for the combined effects of the minor energy sources and sinks leads to a better agreement between the model temperature field and observations.