Aviation and the Global Atmosphere

Aviation and the Global Atmosphere
The largest, single, known radiative forcing change over the past century is from the increase in CO 2 , driven primarily by the burning of fossil fuel. Figure 6-3 shows the
change in CO 2 over the past 1,000 years; the CO 2 concentration increased from about 280 ppmv in 1850 to about 360 ppmv in 1990. Figure 6-4 shows six IPCC
projections for anthropogenic emissions of CO 2 (labeled IS92a-f) and predicted atmospheric CO 2 concentrations. We take the central case, IS92a, as the future
scenario with which to compare aircraft effects. The central aircraft scenario (Fa1) assessed here matches the economic assumptions of IS92a. Radiative forcing for
IS92a is shown in Figure 6-5a, including total radiative forcing and individual contributions.
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Figure 6-4: a) Total anthropogenic CO2 emissions (Gt C yr-1 ) under the IS92 emission
scenarios.
Figure 6-4: b) the resulting atmospheric CO2 concentrations (ppmv) calculated using the
"Bern" carbon cycle model (IPCC, 1996,
Figure 5).