A study on cumulative radiative forcing (CRF) found that China, Europe, and North America experienced temporary periods of nearly no CRF when warming carbon dioxide emissions and cooling aerosol emissions offset each other, and that these periods occurred when the regions had rapidly increasing emissions but enforced few air quality controls; the authors estimate that each region's contribution to future CRF during 2018-2100 from emissions already released into the atmosphere is likely to be larger than the CRF that the region already contributed during 1900-2017, and that though North America has the largest CRF to date, China may emerge as a major contributor.
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Article #18-13951: "Trends and patterns in the contributions to cumulative radiative forcing from different regions of the world," by D. M. Murphy and A. R. Ravishankara.
MEDIA CONTACT: A. R. Ravishankara, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO; tel: 970-491-2876, 720-938-1604; email: a.r.ravishankara@colostate.edu
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences