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The next BCCR Monday Seminar will be shared between Lena Nicola from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Eduardo Alastrué de Asenjo from the University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology. They will both present their work in shorter presentations so the whole session will still be from 11 to 12.

Lena Nicola will introduce her work on "Exploring the future of the Antarctic Ice Sheet with the ice-sheet models PISM and ISSM” and Eduardo Alastrué de Asenjo will talk about "Revisiting AMOC impacts: from temperature extremes to carbon uptake and the economy”.

Lena Nicola
Abstract  

Projections of Antarctica's future sea-level contribution are still subject to great uncertainties, especially with respect to changes in surface mass balance and sub-shelf melting. While the climatic forcing used as boundary conditions for ice sheet models covers the average trend in surface mass balance or ocean temperatures with global warming, extreme events, such as atmospheric heatwaves or regime shifts in the ocean, are typically not yet considered. Using targeted ice-sheet model simulations, we aim to quantify the additional sea-level rise when such extremes are accounted for, and assess their potential to trigger abrupt, possibly irreversible, changes in ice-sheet dynamics. Among others, we have focused on Thwaites Glacier and key oceanic gateways that may allow warm water to reach vulnerable grounding lines, highlighting critical thresholds for Antarctic ice loss.

Speaker information

Lena Nicola is in the process of completing a PhD from the University of Potsdam and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) in the discipline of Climate Physics. Her project is supervised by Prof. Ricarda Winkelmann (PIK, Max-Planck Institute of Geoanthropology) and Dr. Johanna Beckmann (Monash University, Australia) and focuses on exploring the effects of extreme forcing scenarios on Antarctic ice dynamics with numerical ice-sheet models. She studied in Potsdam and Hamburg in Germany, as well as Bergen and Svalbard in Norway. She is one of the co-chairs of APECS Germany and the junior chief editor of the journal Polarforschung from the German Society for Polar Research.

Eduardo Alastrué de Asenjo
Abstract  

Changes in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning circulation (AMOC) are expected to lead to widespread climate impacts. While the long-term AMOC weakening influence on surface temperatures has been widely researched, other impacts in different timescales of variability or climatic variables have not been so thoroughly examined. I present here two different approaches to better understand these neglected AMOC impacts with Earth System Model simulations. First, I examine whether (and in what way) AMOC interannual variability influences European cold extremes when considering realistic forcings. I find that the AMOC interannual variability has the potential to influence European cold extremes, but also that this influence might be changing in a warmer climate. Second, I present an estimation of the economic impact of AMOC weakening by considering its effect on ocean carbon uptake. I quantify how much a weaker AMOC reduces ocean uptake, and conclude that this effect can be as economically relevant as its direct Northern Hemisphere cooling effect.

Speaker information

Eduardo is a finishing PhD student working on Earth system modelling, with a focus on the North Atlantic. He investigates impacts related to the ocean circulation (AMOC), extreme events, and net-zero emissions, and has previously worked on climate variability, detection and attribution, and freshwater hosing simulations. He is part of the International Max Planck Research School on Earth System Modelling at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology and the University of Hamburg, where he is supervised by Prof. Johanna Baehr and Prof. Jana Sillmann. 

Zoom details https://uib.zoom.us/j/62554083320?pwd=w66YFoIhFNBTjgDA4bKppdlKAzpOoj.1