The Understanding of Elevation Dependent Warming from Climate Models

Climate models, both global (GCMs) and regional (RCMs) climate models, provide useful insights into elevation dependent climate response under the increasing anthropogenic greenhouse forcing. They simulate variable response in climate as a function of elevation, including an amplified warming signal at higher elevations, under specific conditions. Moreover, they have been critical in elucidating some of the physical processes that cause elevation dependent warming (EDW). The models have also helped us to quantify sensitivities of those processes and feedbacks, and how these sensitivities vary as a function of elevation and other criteria. This has provided motivation within the scientific community to validate these insights in the selectively available high-elevation observations, as well as informed future needs for new observations and modeling experiments to understand the EDW phenomena. This presentation will provide a selective review of the issues discussed above as well as show results from the analysis of CMIP5 models on EDW in northern hemisphere mid-latitudes, and findings from high elevation observations in the Colorado Rocky Mountains.