Advancing Our Understanding of Eddy-driven Jet Stream Responses to Climate Change – A Roadmap
- Author(s)
- Albert Ossó, Ileana Bladé, Alexey Karpechko, Camille Li, Douglas Maraun, Olivia Romppainen-Martius, Len Shaffrey, Aiko Voigt, Tim Woollings, Giuseppe Zappa
- Abstract
Purpose of Review: Extratropical jets and associated storm tracks significantly influence weather and regional climate across various timescales. Understanding jet responses to climate change is essential for reliable regional climate projections. This review serves two main purposes: (1) to provide an accessible overview of extratropical jet dynamics and a comprehensive examination of current challenges and uncertainties in predicting jet responses to greenhouse gas increases and (2) to suggest innovative experiments to advance our understanding of these responses. Recent Findings: While successive generations of climate model ensembles consistently project a mean poleward shift of the midlatitude zonal-mean maximum winds, there remains considerable intermodel spread and large uncertainty across seasonal and regional jet responses. Of particular note is our limited understanding of how these jets respond to the intricate interplay of multiple concurrent drivers, such as the strong warming in polar and tropical regions, and the relative importance of each factor. Furthermore, the difficulty of simulating processes requiring high resolution, such as those linked to sharp sea surface temperature gradients or diabatic effects related to tropical convection and extratropical cyclones, has historically hindered progress. Summary: We advocate for a collaborative effort to enhance our understanding of the jet stream response to climate change. We propose a series of new experiments that take advantage of recent advances in computing power and modelling capabilities to better resolve small-scale processes such as convective circulations, which we consider essential for a good representation of jet dynamics.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Meteorology and Geophysics
- External organisation(s)
- Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz, Universitat de Barcelona, Finnish Meteorological Institute, University of Bergen (UiB), Universität Bern, University of Reading, University of Oxford, Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Bologna
- Journal
- Current Climate Change Reports
- Volume
- 11
- ISSN
- 2198-6061
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1007/s40641-024-00199-3
- Publication date
- 2025
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 105205 Climate change, 105206 Meteorology
- Keywords
- ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Global and Planetary Change, Atmospheric Science
- Sustainable Development Goals
- SDG 13 - Climate Action
- Portal url
- https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/7c40114f-911c-4a0b-9760-4bdbe3f0f6eb