Computer Simulation of the Global Climatic Effects of Increased Greenhouse Gases

Abstract

In conjunction with the Scientific Visualization Program at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, University of Illinois, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research have produced a visualization of the climate system and the possible climate change as sociated with increased greenhouse gases in the atmo sphere. Through animation, the global and seasonal dis tribution of surface air temperature and the temporal and spatial distributions of surface temperature change caused by increased CO₂ are shown. The geographical distribution of seasonally time-averaged atmospheric temperature difference due to the simulated hypothetical greenhouse warming is shown in a three-dimensional box with the surface soil-moisture changes superim posed in order to highlight their association.

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