Articles | Volume 25, issue 22
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-16451-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-16451-2025
Research article
 | 
24 Nov 2025
Research article |  | 24 Nov 2025

The ACCESS-AM2 climate model underestimates aerosol concentration in the Southern Ocean; improving aerosol representation could be problematic for the global energy balance

Sonya L. Fiddes, Matthew T. Woodhouse, Marc D. Mallet, Liam J. Lamprey, Ruhi S. Humphries, Alain Protat, Simon P. Alexander, Hakase Hayashida, Samuel Putland, Branka Miljevic, and Robyn Schofield

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Cited articles

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Short summary
The interaction between natural marine aerosols, clouds and radiation in the Southern Ocean is a major source of uncertainty in climate models. We evaluate the Australian climate model using aerosol observations and find it underestimates aerosol number often by over 50%. Model changes were tested to improve aerosol concentrations, but some of our changes had severe negative effects on the larger climate system, highlighting issues in aerosol-cloud interaction modelling.
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