The Earth's Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity and Thermal Inertia

TL;DR

This paper investigates Earth's thermal inertia and its impact on climate sensitivity, providing a quantitative relation that enhances understanding of transient versus equilibrium climate responses for policymaking.

Contribution

It introduces an empirical relation linking thermal inertia time scale to the difference between transient and equilibrium climate sensitivities, based on observational data.

Findings

The difference between transient and equilibrium climate sensitivities is proportional to the thermal inertia time scale.

A numerical value for the proportionality factor is determined from recent observational data.

The relation offers new insights for climate policy decisions.

Abstract

The Earth's equilibrium climate sensitivity has received much attention because of its relevance and importance for global warming policymaking. This paper focuses on the Earth's \emph{thermal inertia time scale} which has received relatively little attention. The difference between the observed transient climate sensitivity and the equilibrium climate sensitivity is shown to be proportional to the thermal inertia time scale, and the numerical value of the proportionality factor is determined using recent observational data. Many useful policymaking insights can be extracted from the resulting empirical quantitative relation.