Aviation effects on already-existing cirrus clouds.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Tesche M
PROVIDER: S-EPMC4919534 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Jun
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Aviation effects on already-existing cirrus clouds.
Tesche Matthias M Achtert Peggy P Glantz Paul P Noone Kevin J KJ
Nature communications 20160621
Determining the effects of the formation of contrails within natural cirrus clouds has proven to be challenging. Quantifying any such effects is necessary if we are to properly account for the influence of aviation on climate. Here we quantify the effect of aircraft on the optical thickness of already-existing cirrus clouds by matching actual aircraft flight tracks to satellite lidar measurements. We show that there is a systematic, statistically significant increase in normalized cirrus cloud o ...[more]
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