Radiative effect of two contrail cirrus outbreaks over Western Europe estimated using geostationary satellite observations and radiative transfer calculations

Wang, X., Wolf, K., Boucher, O. and Bellouin, N. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2109-9559 (2024) Radiative effect of two contrail cirrus outbreaks over Western Europe estimated using geostationary satellite observations and radiative transfer calculations. Geophysical Research Letters, 51 (7). e2024GL108452. ISSN 0094-8276 doi: 10.1029/2024GL108452

Abstract/Summary

Estimation of the perturbation to the Earth’s energy budget by contrail outbreaks is required for estimating the climate impact of aviation and verifying the climate benefits of proposed contrail avoidance strategies such as aircraft rerouting. Here we identified two successive large-scale contrail outbreaks developing in clear-sky conditions in geostationary and polar-orbiting satellite infrared images of Western Europe lasting from 22 to 23 June 2020. Their hourly cloud radiative effect, obtained using geostationary satellite cloud retrievals and radiative transfer calculations, is negative or weakly positive during daytime and positive during nighttime. The cumulative energy forcing of the two outbreaks is 7 PJ and –8.5 PJ, with uncertainties of 3 PJ, stemming each from approximately 15-20 flights over periods of 19 and 7 hours, respectively. This study suggests that an automated quantification of contrail outbreak radiative effect is possible, at least for contrails forming in clear sky conditions.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/115856
Identification Number/DOI	10.1029/2024GL108452
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	American Geophysical Union
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