Climatic consequences of regional nuclear conflicts

Alan D. Robock · Luke D. Oman · Georgiy L. Stenchikov · Owen Brian Toon · Charles Bardeen · R. P. Turco

174 citations0/0 files storedAtmospheric chemistry and physics

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Nuclear Issues and Defense Atmospheric aerosols and clouds Climate Change and Geoengineering

Abstract

Abstract. We use a modern climate model and new estimates of smoke generated by fires in contemporary cities to calculate the response of the climate system to a regional nuclear war between emerging third world nuclear powers using 100 Hiroshima-size bombs (less than 0.03% of the explosive yield of the current global nuclear arsenal) on cities in the subtropics. We find significant cooling and reductions of precipitation lasting years, which would impact the global food supply. The climate changes are large and long-lasting because the fuel loadings in modern cities are quite high and the subtropical solar insolation heats the resulting smoke cloud and lofts it into the high stratosphere, where removal mechanisms are slow. While the climate changes are less dramatic than found in previous "nuclear winter'' simulations of a massive nuclear exchange between the superpowers, because less smoke is emitted, the changes are more long-lasting because the older models did not adequately represent the stratospheric plume rise.

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References

1983Nuclear Winter: Global Consequences of Multiple Nuclear Explosions 2016The Atmosphere After a Nuclear War: Twilight at Noon 2007Nuclear winter revisited with a modern climate model and current nuclear arsenals: Still catastrophic consequences 1983Volcano weather: the story of 1816, the year without a summer [Indonesia]

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