Thermodynamic Analysis of Snowball Earth Hysteresis Experiment: Efficiency, Entropy Production, and Irreversibility

Abstract

We present an extensive thermodynamic analysis of a hysteresis experiment performed on a simplified yet Earth-like climate model. We slowly vary the solar constant by 20% around the present value and detect a substantial bistability: for a large range of values the realization of snowball (SB) or of warm (W) climate conditions depend on the history of the system. Using recent results on the global climate thermodynamics, we show that that the two regimes feature radically different properties. The efficiency of the climate machine increases with decreasing solar constant in W climate conditions, whereas the opposite takes place in the SB regime. Instead, entropy production is increasing with the solar constant in both branches of climate conditions, and its value is about 4 times as large in the W branch than in the corresponding C state. Finally, the degree of irreversibility of the system is much higher in the W conditions, with an explosive growth in the upper range of the considered values of solar constants. Whereas in the SB regime a dominating role is played by changes in the meridional albedo contrast, in the W climate regime changes in the intensity of latent heat fluxes are crucial for determining the observed properties. This substantiates the importance of addressing correctly the variations of the hydrological cycle in a changing climate. An interpretation of the transitions at the boundary of the bistable region based upon macro-scale thermodynamic properties is also proposed. Our results support the adoption of a new generation of diagnostic tools based on the 2nd law of thermodynamics for auditing climate model and outline a set of parameterizations to be used in conceptual and intermediate complexity models or for the reconstruction of the past climate conditions.