Uploaded September 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Clouds and Climate: The very latest surprising science...
Tropical marine low clouds, which regulate Earth's climate, may amplify the greenhouse effect by 71% more than previously thought.
Earth's overall reflective cloud cover has been shrinking over the past two decades. This shrinkage allows more sunlight to reach the surface, exacerbating global warming. The reduction in clouds, rather than a decrease in cloud reflectivity due to pollution, is a primary driver of this trend, linked to changes in atmospheric circulation, tropical expansion, and storm track shifts.
Low clouds, including stratocumulus clouds over oceans, are becoming less extensive and darker, reflecting less sunlight and intensifying warming in a feedback cycle. This reduction is partly driven by warming sea surface temperatures that thin or break up these clouds.
Arctic cloud changes are complicating predictions of Arctic warming. Warmer Arctic conditions are causing clouds to shift from containing mostly ice to more liquid droplets at wintertime, which trap more heat and enhance surface warming. Many climate models underestimate this "cloud emissivity feedback," resulting in underestimates of future Arctic temperatures.
Biological activity also influences cloud formation. Gases released by plants and ocean plankton contribute to aerosol particles that serve as cloud droplets' seeds. New detailed studies show these natural processes occurring miles above forests play a bigger role in cloud formation than previously understood.
Overall, clouds are a major source of uncertainty but also a key amplifier of recent global warming by shrinking, rising higher, or changing composition, which affects how much sunlight they reflect or heat they trap. Understanding these cloud dynamics is crucial for refining climate models and better predicting future warming.
Fewer and thinner low clouds, shifts in cloud composition in polar regions, and biological contributions to cloud formation all impact climate feedback loops, making clouds a highly active and critical climate factor.
Please donate to PaulBeckwith.net to support my research and videos connecting the dots on abrupt climate system mayhem.
Please subscribe to my YouTube channel. As well as my website, and YouTube, you can find me on Patreon, Facebook, Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Instagram, Reddit (multiple climate channels within), Quora, TikTok, Discord, Mastodon, Twitch, Vimeo, Bluesky, TruthSocial, Threads, Substack, Tumblr, Pinterest, etc...
Links:
Science News: Researchers' breakthrough method reveals clouds amplify global warming far more than previously understood: sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/03/250326123546.htm
Peer-reviewed science paper: Multi-objective observational constraint of tropical Atlantic and Pacific low-cloud variability narrows uncertainty in cloud feedback
nature.com/articles/s41467-024-53985-w
Phys.org article: Rapid cloud loss is contributing to record-breaking temperatures, new study shows
phys.org/news/2025-06-rapid-cloud-loss-contributing-temperatures.html
Peer-reviewed science paper: Contraction of the World's Storm-Cloud Zones the Primary Contributor to the 21st Century Increase in the Earth's Sunlight Absorption
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2025GL114882
Phys.org article: Cloud cover decline may be driving Earth's record temperatures
phys.org/news/2025-02-cloud-decline-earth-temperatures.html
Science paper: Decadal changes in atmospheric circulation detected in cloud motion vectors
nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09242-1
Article: A key and enigmatic player in global warming? Clouds
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/environment/article/2025/05/06/a-key-and-enigmatic-player-in-global-warming-clouds_6740982_114.html
Article: Clouds may be skewing Arctic warming predictions, says study
rcinet.ca/eye-on-the-arctic/2025/05/22/clouds-may-be-skewing-arctic-warming-predictions-says-study
Peer-reviewed science: How Does Cloud Emissivity Feedback AffectPresent and Future Arctic Warming? spj.science.org/doi/epdf/10.34133/olar.0089
Article: Scientists Are Just Beginning to Understand How Life Makes Clouds, and Their Discoveries May Drastically Improve Climate Science
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/scientists-are-just-beginning-to-understand-how-life-makes-clouds-and-their-discoveries-may-drastically-improve-climate-science-180986872
Please donate to PaulBeckwith.net to support my research and videos connecting the dots on abrupt climate system mayhem.
Please subscribe to my YouTube channel. As well as my website, and YouTube, you can find me on Patreon, Facebook, Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Instagram, Reddit (multiple climate channels within), Quora, TikTok, Discord, Mastodon, Twitch, Vimeo, Bluesky, TruthSocial, Threads, Substack, Tumblr, Pinterest, etc...
Clouds and Climate: The very latest surprising science...
Tropical marine low clouds, which regulate Earth's climate, may amplify the greenhouse effect by 71% more than previously thought.
Earth's overall reflective cloud cover has been shrinking over the past two decades. This shrinkage allows more sunlight to reach the surface, exacerbating global warming. The reduction in clouds, rather than a decrease in cloud reflectivity due to pollution, is a primary driver of this trend, linked to changes in atmospheric circulation, tropical expansion, and storm track shifts.
Low clouds, including stratocumulus clouds over oceans, are becoming less extensive and darker, reflecting less sunlight and intensifying warming in a feedback cycle. This reduction is partly driven by warming sea surface temperatures that thin or break up these clouds.
Arctic cloud changes are complicating predictions of Arctic warming. Warmer Arctic conditions are causing clouds to shift from containing mostly ice to more liquid droplets at wintertime, which trap more heat and enhance surface warming. Many climate models underestimate this "cloud emissivity feedback," resulting in underestimates of future Arctic temperatures.
Biological activity also influences cloud formation. Gases released by plants and ocean plankton contribute to aerosol particles that serve as cloud droplets' seeds. New detailed studies show these natural processes occurring miles above forests play a bigger role in cloud formation than previously understood.
Overall, clouds are a major source of uncertainty but also a key amplifier of recent global warming by shrinking, rising higher, or changing composition, which affects how much sunlight they reflect or heat they trap. Understanding these cloud dynamics is crucial for refining climate models and better predicting future warming.
Fewer and thinner low clouds, shifts in cloud composition in polar regions, and biological contributions to cloud formation all impact climate feedback loops, making clouds a highly active and critical climate factor.
Please donate to PaulBeckwith.net to support my research and videos connecting the dots on abrupt climate system mayhem.
Please subscribe to my YouTube channel. As well as my website, and YouTube, you can find me on Patreon, Facebook, Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Instagram, Reddit (multiple climate channels within), Quora, TikTok, Discord, Mastodon, Twitch, Vimeo, Bluesky, TruthSocial, Threads, Substack, Tumblr, Pinterest, etc...
Links:
Science News: Researchers' breakthrough method reveals clouds amplify global warming far more than previously understood: sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/03/250326123546.htm
Peer-reviewed science paper: Multi-objective observational constraint of tropical Atlantic and Pacific low-cloud variability narrows uncertainty in cloud feedback
nature.com/articles/s41467-024-53985-w
Phys.org article: Rapid cloud loss is contributing to record-breaking temperatures, new study shows
phys.org/news/2025-06-rapid-cloud-loss-contributing-temperatures.html
Peer-reviewed science paper: Contraction of the World's Storm-Cloud Zones the Primary Contributor to the 21st Century Increase in the Earth's Sunlight Absorption
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2025GL114882
Phys.org article: Cloud cover decline may be driving Earth's record temperatures
phys.org/news/2025-02-cloud-decline-earth-temperatures.html
Science paper: Decadal changes in atmospheric circulation detected in cloud motion vectors
nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09242-1
Article: A key and enigmatic player in global warming? Clouds
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/environment/article/2025/05/06/a-key-and-enigmatic-player-in-global-warming-clouds_6740982_114.html
Article: Clouds may be skewing Arctic warming predictions, says study
rcinet.ca/eye-on-the-arctic/2025/05/22/clouds-may-be-skewing-arctic-warming-predictions-says-study
Peer-reviewed science: How Does Cloud Emissivity Feedback AffectPresent and Future Arctic Warming? spj.science.org/doi/epdf/10.34133/olar.0089
Article: Scientists Are Just Beginning to Understand How Life Makes Clouds, and Their Discoveries May Drastically Improve Climate Science
smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/scientists-are-just-beginning-to-understand-how-life-makes-clouds-and-their-discoveries-may-drastically-improve-climate-science-180986872
Please donate to PaulBeckwith.net to support my research and videos connecting the dots on abrupt climate system mayhem.
Please subscribe to my YouTube channel. As well as my website, and YouTube, you can find me on Patreon, Facebook, Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Instagram, Reddit (multiple climate channels within), Quora, TikTok, Discord, Mastodon, Twitch, Vimeo, Bluesky, TruthSocial, Threads, Substack, Tumblr, Pinterest, etc...
