The effect of an evolving Greenland ice sheet in NorESM2 projections

The Greenland ice sheet's mass loss is increasing and so is its impact to the climate system. Yet, Earth System models mostly keep ice sheets at a constant extent or treat interactions with the ice sheets fairly simple.

Here, we present the first simulations of NorESM2 coupled to the ice sheet model CISM over Greenland. We compare NorESM2 simulations from 1850 to 2300 with and without an evolving ice sheet over Greenland based on the ssp585 scenario and its extension to 2300. Ocean and atmosphere horizontal resolution are on 1deg, while the coupled ice sheet module CISM is running on 4km. The coupling setup is based on CESM2. Ice extent and elevation are provided to the atmosphere every 5years and the land model every year. Whereas the ice sheet receives updated surface mass balance every year.
We show the evolution of the Greenland ice sheet and changes in atmosphere, ocean and sea ice.

Overall global mean surface air temperatures (SAT) change from 14°C to 24°C by 2300 with the steepest increase between 2070-2200.
Over the Southern ocean and Antarctica, SAT are increasing by 10°C, while over the Northern hemisphere we see a change of 15-28°C by 2300. 
At the end of the simulations (year 2300), SAT over Greenland are 6°C warmer when including an evolving ice sheet. In contrast, the ocean surrounding Greenland shows SAT that are 2°C colder in the coupled system, compared to the simulation with a fixed Greenland ice sheet. Sea surface temperatures show the same ~2°C difference around Greenland in coupled and uncoupled simulation. The overall change in sea surface temperatures is 12°C.
Minimum and maximum sea ice extent differs only slightly with and without the coupling, indicating that the overall warming seems to dictate speed of the sea ice retreat.