Abstract
The most recent generation of climate models exhibits an alarming
increase in high climate sensitivity models compared to previous
generations. Because the calculation of equilibrium climate sensitivity
(ECS) requires simulations of a thousand years or more, most studies
estimate ECS using shorter model integrations. However, the most widely
used method for estimating ECS from shorter simulations underestimates
ECS. Previous studies attributed this underestimate to the
time-dependence of climate feedbacks. Here we demonstrate that it
actually arises from an underestimate of the radiative forcing. We
present a modified method that corrects for this underestimate and is
shown to better agree with ECS calculated from “long run”,
millennium-scale simulations. This method reveals that the actual number
of “too hot” models is roughly double that previously diagnosed, with
one out of every three CMIP6 climate models having an ECS greater than
5K - the “very likely” upper bound on ECS.