Arctic warming, atmospheric blocking and cold European winters in CMIP5 models

Woollings, T., Harvey, B. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6510-8181 and Masato, G. (2014) Arctic warming, atmospheric blocking and cold European winters in CMIP5 models. Environmental Research Letters, 9 (1). 014002. ISSN 1748-9326 doi: 10.1088/1748-9326/9/1/014002

Abstract/Summary

Amplified Arctic warming is expected to have a significant longterm influence on the midlatitude atmospheric circulation by the latter half of the 21st century. Potential influences of recent and near future Arctic changes on shorter timescales are much less clear, despite having received much recent attention in the literature. In this letter, climate models from the recent CMIP5 experiment are analysed for evidence of an influence of Arctic temperatures on midlatitude blocking and cold European winters in particular. The focus is on the variability of these features in detrended data and, in contrast to other studies, limited evidence of an influence is found. The occurrence of cold European winters is found to be largely independent of the temperature variability in the key Barents–Kara Sea region. Positive correlations of the Barents–Kara temperatures with Eurasian blocking are found in some models, but significant correlations are limited.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/37006
Identification Number/DOI	10.1088/1748-9326/9/1/014002
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > NCAS Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	Institute of Physics
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