Arctic Ocean Radiative Fluxes and Cloud Forcing Estimated from the ISCCP C2 Cloud Dataset, 1983–1990

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Abstract

Radiative fluxes and cloud forcings for the ocean areas of the Arctic are computed from the monthly cloud product of the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP) for 1983–90. Spatially averaged short-wave fluxes compare well with climatological values, while downwelling longwave fluxes are significantly lower. This is probably due to the fact that the ISCCP cloud amounts are underestimates. Top-of-the-atmosphere radiative fluxes are in excellent agreement with measurements from the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE). Computed cloud forcings indicate that clouds have a warming effect at the surface and at the top of the atmosphere during winter and a cooling effect during summer. The net radiative effect of clouds is larger at the surface during winter but greater at the top of the atmosphere during summer. Overall the net radiative effect of clouds at the top of the atmosphere is one of cooling. This is in contrast to a previous result from ERBE data showing that arctic cloud forcings have a net warming effect. Sensitivities to errors in input parameters are generally greater during winter with cloud amount being the most important parameter. During summer the surface radiation balance is most sensitive to errors in the measurements of surface reflectance. The results are encouraging, but the estimated error of 20 W m⁻² in surface net radiative fluxes is too large, given that estimates of the net radiative warming effect due to a doubling of CO₂ are on the order of 4 W m⁻². Because it is difficult to determine the accuracy of results with existing in situ observations, it is recommended that the development of improved algorithms for the retrieval of surface radiative properties be accompanied by the simultaneous assembly of validation datasets.

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