The World Heat Budget: Expected Changes
C.J.E. Schuurmans
Abstract
Coastal zones, through the ages, have been shaped by the rise and fall of sea level and river flows, which themselves are intimately related to the climate. Climate itself is the result of complex interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, and land, including its ice-covered part. Climate changes in most cases are not uniform all over the globe. Even in the case of a uniform forcing, the response of the system may be quite different at different latitudes, and even longitudinally. More explicit computations of cloud processes and ocean-atmosphere coupling in itself will not narrow the uncertainty gap. Real improvements are only possible on the basis of a better understanding of the processes involved. Several reasons have been put forward to explain the apparently lower observed rate of warming over the past century. Simulations of the present climate by such models (GCMs) are still not perfect, but the gross features of the earth’s climate are reasonably well simulated.