Forcing closure suggests stronger aerosol forcing and higher climate sensitivity than the consensus

Forcing together with radiative responses and natural variability has sharply increased Earth's energy imbalance (EEI), a key driver of climate change, between 2003 and 2023.

By Yuan, Song, Van Loon +3Science AdvancesOct 16, 2026

Score████░░░░░░4.3

VerdictWorth a reader's time today.

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Abstract

Forcing together with radiative responses and natural variability has sharply increased Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI), a key driver of climate change, between 2003 and 2023. Declining anthropogenic aerosol emissions and increasing greenhouse gas concentrations are the leading contributors to the forcing. However, observation-based and model-based forcing estimates disagree on the magnitude of aerosol forcing, particularly for effective radiative forcing from aerosol-cloud interactions (ERF ACI ). Here, we show that two independent observation-based estimates of forcing trends achieve unexpectedly good closure between 2003 and 2023. The corresponding model-based trend is within the uncertainty range of observations but substantially smaller, with most of the difference due to models’ underestimation of cloud fraction adjustment to aerosols. Our results suggest a prominent role of aerosols in the recent EEI increase and stronger total historical ERF ACI and higher equilibrium climate sensitivity than the current consensus, with a likely range between 2.8° and 4.8°C.

Tianle Yuan, Hua Song, Senne Van Loon, Ryan J. Kramer, Lazaros Oreopoulos, Piers M. de F. Forster

The editor's rubric

Heuristic review

Leverage3 / 5: A method or resource many groups across the field will adopt within a year.; 16% of this desk’s rubric
Magnitude2 / 5: Solid incremental gain on a meaningful problem.; 20% of this desk’s rubric
Evidence3 / 5: Solid: multiple benchmarks or cohorts, ablations, fair baselines, released code or data.; 20% of this desk’s rubric
Novelty3 / 5: A genuinely new approach to an open problem.; 10% of this desk’s rubric
Trajectory2 / 5: Some room to improve with obvious engineering.; 14% of this desk’s rubric
Stakes3 / 5: Meaningful benefit to many people within a few years.; 20% of this desk’s rubric

Dimension	Level	Weight	What that level means
Leverage	███░░ 3	16%	A method or resource many groups across the field will adopt within a year.
Magnitude	██░░░ 2	20%	Solid incremental gain on a meaningful problem.
Evidence	███░░ 3	20%	Solid: multiple benchmarks or cohorts, ablations, fair baselines, released code or data.
Novelty	███░░ 3	10%	A genuinely new approach to an open problem.
Trajectory	██░░░ 2	14%	Some room to improve with obvious engineering.
Stakes	███░░ 3	20%	Meaningful benefit to many people within a few years.

Editor’s rationale

Heuristic triage from title and abstract text only, not a reading of the paper. Cues found: method (we report); novelty (unexpected, contrary to expectation); verification (error bars, independent replication); stakes (energy, climate).

How the score was computed

rank-2026-10-18

Score████░░░░░░4.3

Score = 10 × (75% × adjusted merit / 10 + 15% × attention + 10% × freshness)

Desks place stronger verdicts first, then use this score to order work within the same verdict.

Merit: 5.3 / 10; Weighted rubric, evidence-gated.
Adjusted merit: 4.6 / 10; Shrunk toward the desk prior by editor confidence (44%).
Attention: 0%; Citations, upvotes, points, mentions.
Freshness: 85%; Half-life decay since publication.

Citations0 (reference 15, via openalex, Oct 18, 2026, 07:29 UTC)

The record

Reviewed by heuristic-v7 on Oct 18, 2026, 07:29 UTC. Paper type: method.
Categories: Atmospheric aerosols and clouds, Climate variability and models, Climate Change and Geoengineering, Global and Planetary Change, Environmental Science
BRIEF, No.1 in the Climate & Energy edition of October 18, 2026.