Short description
The Arctic is warming at more than twice the global average rate, yet one of the biggest uncertainties in understanding and predicting its future lies in how clouds will respond to these changes.
The cloud phase — whether clouds are made of liquid droplets, ice crystals, or a mixture of both — determines how clouds interact with radiation and influencing the surface warming.
As sea-ice retreats, the newly exposed ocean surface may release more natural ice-nucleating particles (INPs) from marine biological activity, potentially causing clouds to contain more ice even in a warming climate. This process could alter cloud reflectivity, lifetime, and precipitation, thereby changing their radiative impact in ways not fully captured by current climate models.
With the ClearArctic project we want to investigate how INPs, cloud phase changes, and sea-ice loss are interconnected, using satellite observations, in-situ measurements and climate modelling to improve the understanding of Arctic cloud feedbacks related with cloud phase changes. The aim of the project is to enhance future climate projections.
Objectives
There are three overall objectives of the ClearArctic project:
- Quantify the cloud feedback related with the cloud phase change.
- Understanding how cloud phase curve changes will affect the cloud phase feedback.
- Investigate how cloud phase curve will change with arctic warming and sea ice retreat and then study the impacts on the cloud feedback and future Arctic climate.
