Abstract
Clear‐sky longwave radiative feedback processes depicted in climate models prepared for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) are investigated using satellite observations of the clear‐sky outgoing longwave radiation (OLR). Estimates of clear‐sky longwave radiative damping are derived from regional, seasonal, and interannual sources of variability. In spite of well‐known biases of tropospheric temperature and humidity in climate models, comparisons indicate that the intermodel range in the rate of clear‐sky radiative damping are small despite large intermodel variability in the mean clear‐sky OLR. Moreover, the model‐simulated rates of radiative damping are consistent with those obtained from satellite observations and are indicative of a strong positive correlation between temperature and water vapor variations over a broad range of spatiotemporal scales.
