Transition of the Sun to a Regime of High Activity: Implications for the Earth Climate and Role of Atmospheric Chemistry

Abstract

AbstractIt was recently suggested that the Sun could switch to a high‐activity regime which would lead to a rise of ultraviolet radiation with an amplitude of about four times larger than the amplitude of an average solar activity cycle and a simultaneous drop in total solar irradiance. Here, we applied the SOCOLv3‐MPIOM model with an interacting ocean to simulate the response of chemistry, dynamics, and temperature of Earth's atmosphere to such a change in solar irradiance. We studied the effect of high activity regime on the atmosphere investigating the influence of the chemical and radiative processes on the climate, and chemistry of NOx, HOx, and O3. We find a climate cooling by up to 1K and a substantial increase in stratospheric ozone (up to 14%) and total ozone (up to 8%). To understand the role of the different processes we performed simulations with two sets of forcing accounting separately for the influence on chemical processes and for direct radiation energy balance. Our calculations show that the stratospheric O3 response is almost fully driven by the chemical processes. We also found that the direct radiation processes lead to near‐surface cooling that results in the suppression of the Brewer‐Dobson circulation. This, in turn, leads to the reduction of H2O influx from the low layers of the troposphere and to less intensive transport of ozone from the tropics to the middle latitudes. The surface climate response is dominated by direct radiation influence with only a small contribution from chemical processes.