Clouds and Climate

Abstract

A collection of vortices with an eddying nature . . . full of water, being necessarily precipitated when full of rain, then they fall heavily upon each other, and burst, and clap.

On the Isotopic Composition of Cold Pools in Radiative‐Convective Equilibrium

“…In spite of considerable progress over the last decade (see, e.g., Pincus et al, 2018;Siebesma et al, 2020, and references therein), many processes involved in cumulus convection remain underconstrained. In turn, this has repercussions on our understanding of the climate system, our ability to clarify its past, and predict its future.…”

“…I test the consistency of the results presented above with a downdraft model similar to the bulk plume models used to study shallow cumulus clouds (e.g., Siebesma & Cuijpers, 1995;Siebesma et al, 2020). I begin with the assumption that the bulk downdraft can be separated from its surrounding environment.…”

“…Uncertainties in our understanding of cumulus clouds and their interactions with the larger scales have important repercussions, for example, in future projections and estimates of climate sensitivity derived from model simulations (e.g., Zhao et al, 2016). Indeed, the representation of cumulus clouds in numerical models remains an outstanding challenge in climate science (Arakawa, 2004;Siebesma et al, 2020).Stable water isotopologues have proved to be important tools to better understand and constrain processes regarding cumulus clouds and, more generally, atmospheric convection (e.g.…”

Minimal Recipes for Global Cloudiness

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Clouds are one of the most fascinating, important, and complex components of Earth's climate system (Siebesma et al, 2020). Despite their importance, theoretical understanding of what controls planetary-wide cloudiness is largely absent.

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“…Despite their importance, theoretical understanding of what controls planetary-wide cloudiness is largely absent. For example, while we have a good understanding of how clouds form and interact with radiation (Cotton et al, 2014;Houze, 2014;Siebesma et al, 2020), it is difficult to use these theories to make claims about global cloudiness. Earth System Models (ESMs) and other bottom-up approaches do couple simple models of cloud formation to the global circulation.…”