Negligible Contribution from Aerosols to Recent Trends in Earth’s Energy Imbalance

Negligible Contribution from Aerosols to Recent Trends in Earth’s Energy Imbalance | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Negligible Contribution from Aerosols to Recent Trends in Earth’s Energy Imbalance Chanyoung Park, Brian Soden This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-5679586/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract During the 21st century, Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) at the top of the atmosphere has markedly increased, mainly due to an increase in absorbed shortwave (SW) rather than a decrease in outgoing longwave (LW) radiation. While previous studies, based on single-forcing (aerosol-only) experiments, linked reductions in anthropogenic aerosols to this positive SW trend, we find that both aerosol-radiation interactions and aerosol-cloud interactions have had a negligible impact on recent increases in the EEI. We estimate recent trends in effective radiative forcing due to aerosols using observations and reanalysis data. While aerosol concentrations have declined in the Northern Hemisphere (NH), wildfires and volcanic activity in the Southern Hemisphere (SH) have resulted in larger aerosol loading. This contrast effectively cancels out the total aerosol forcing, resulting in a negligible global impact on the EEI trend. Our findings also suggest that model-driven estimates may be overestimated, as they overlook the compensating effects of SH aerosol emissions that balance out NH reductions. Earth and environmental sciences/Climate sciences/Climate change/Attribution Earth and environmental sciences/Climate sciences/Climate change Full Text Additional Declarations There is NO Competing Interest. Supplementary Files NCCSupplementaryinitialsubmission.docx Supplementary Information Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-5679586","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":401644127,"identity":"7662b006-6cc7-4e3f-a963-e3c69e4b8788","order_by":0,"name":"Chanyoung Park","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAA/UlEQVRIiWNgGAWjYDACCRTeARsGNhDFwMBMtJY00rUchrFwa+Gf3fzsMU/F4Tx5B96DnyvOnI/mYz+deIChwjqxAZcld46ZG/OcOVxseIAvWfLMjdu5bTy5Gw4wnEnHqcVAIsFMmrftcOLGBh4DyYYPQC0MQC2MQBHcWtK/wbQY/2z4cC63jf8tUMs/fFpyILbMZ+Axk2y4cSC3TQJkSwNuLRI3csok5wBdvoGZL82y4UwyUAvQloRj6ca4tPDPSN8m8QYYPvPbew/fbDhmlzu/P3fzhw811rK4tIAAEw/IhYd5kIQS8CgHAcYfQEK+gYeAslEwCkbBKBixAAB8SGJlaTwMPAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8644-1031","institution":"University of Miami","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Chanyoung","middleName":"","lastName":"Park","suffix":""},{"id":401644128,"identity":"57f1fda4-63e8-4041-b46a-3eb807c9508a","order_by":1,"name":"Brian Soden","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"University of Miami","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Brian","middleName":"","lastName":"Soden","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2024-12-19 22:20:14","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5679586/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5679586/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":79275742,"identity":"e060b43c-3692-4457-9634-57a31e86d5ac","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-03-26 12:13:53","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":838775,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"NCCManuscriptinitialsubmission.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5679586/v1_covered_254a8f5a-8244-47ec-92cd-722fb77c1858.pdf"},{"id":79273309,"identity":"d3e110ed-910b-4475-91db-ad430a4da057","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-03-26 11:41:48","extension":"docx","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":4243145,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"Supplementary Information","description":"","filename":"NCCSupplementaryinitialsubmission.docx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5679586/v1/ebf02066db60eda03e3e6be4.docx"}],"financialInterests":"There is \u003cb\u003eNO\u003c/b\u003e Competing Interest.","formattedTitle":"Negligible Contribution from Aerosols to Recent Trends in Earth’s Energy Imbalance","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5679586/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5679586/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003eDuring the 21st century, Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) at the top of the atmosphere has markedly increased, mainly due to an increase in absorbed shortwave (SW) rather than a decrease in outgoing longwave (LW) radiation. 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