ing traditionally has been defined as the instantaneous change in energy flux at the tropopause resulting from a change in a component external to the climate system. Many current applications use an “adjusted” radiative forcing in which the stratosphere is allowed to relax to thermal steady state, thus focusing on the energy imbalance in the Earth and troposphere system, which is most relevant to surface temperature change. Once the stratosphere has been allowed to adjust to a forcing, the change in energy flux at the tropopause is equivalent to that at the top of the atmosphere (TOA), which is how radiative forcings are commonly reported.

Figure ES-2 shows the magnitude of several important forcings as esti-

FIGURE ES-2 Estimated radiative forcing since preindustrial times for the Earth and troposphere system (TOA radiative forcing with adjusted stratospheric temperatures). The height of the rectangular bar denotes a central or best estimate of the forcing, while each vertical line is an estimate of the uncertainty range associated with the forcing, guided by the spread in the published record and physical understanding, and with no statistical connotation. Each forcing agent is associated with a level of scientific understanding, which is based on an assessment of the nature of assumptions involved, the uncertainties prevailing about the processes that govern the forcing, and the resulting confidence in the numerical values of the estimate. On the vertical axis, the direction of expected surface temperature change due to each radiative forcing is indicated by the labels “warming” and “cooling.” SOURCE: IPCC (2001).

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