Since both #aerosols and #clouds have decreased over #Europe, both would influence this brightening.

Using #MERRA-2 reanalysis, which assimilates #satellite-derived aerosols, we found that the fractional sensitivity of surface #shortwave radiation is 5 times higher for #clouds

Granted, we did this by solving a simple system of equations that assumes similar bulk sensitivities of the climate system to aerosols and clouds over both #Europe and #China.

So how important is the impact of this effective climate sensitivity versus the radiative effect on the local temperature response?

We examined using a perturbation analysis between 1980 and 2019 using #NASA's #MERRA-2 reanalysis.