The pandemic in 2020 caused an abrupt change in the emission of anthropogenic aerosols and their precursors. We estimate the associated change in the aerosol radiative forcing at the top of the atmosphere and the surface. To that end, we perform new simulations with the CMIP6 global climate model EC-Earth3. The simulations use the here newly created data for the anthropogenic aerosol optical properties and an associated effect on clouds from the simple plumes parameterization (MACv2-SP), based on revised SO₂ and NH₃ emission scenarios. Our results highlight the small impact of the pandemic on the global aerosol radiative forcing in 2020 compared to the CMIP6 scenario SSP2-4.5 of the order of +0.04 Wm⁻², which is small compared to the natural year-to-year variability in the radiation budget. Natural variability also limits the ability to detect a meaningful regional difference in the anthropogenic aerosol radiative effects. We identify the best chances to find a significant change in radiation at the surface during cloud-free conditions for regions that were strongly polluted in the past years. The post-pandemic recovery scenarios indicate a spread in the aerosol forcing of −0.68 to −0.38 Wm⁻² for 2050 relative to the pre-industrial, which translates to a difference of +0.05 to −0.25 Wm⁻² compared to the 2050 baseline from SSP2-4.5. This spread falls within the present-day uncertainty in aerosol radiative forcing and the CMIP6 spread in aerosol forcing at the end of the 21st century. We release the new MACv2-SP data for studies on the climate response to the pandemic and the recovery scenarios. Our 2050 forcing estimates suggest that sustained aerosol emission reductions during the post-pandemic recovery cause a stronger climate response than in 2020, i.e., there is a delayed influence of the pandemic on climate.

2020年的大流行导致人为气溶胶及其前体的排放发生突然变化。我们估计了大气顶部和地表气溶胶辐射强迫的相关变化。为此，我们使用 CMIP6 全球气候模型 EC-Earth3 进行新的模拟。模拟使用此处新创建的数据来了解人为气溶胶光学特性以及简单羽流参数化 (MACv2-SP) 对云的相关影响，基于修订的 SO ₂和 NH ₃排放情景。我们的结果强调，与+0.04Wm ⁻²量级的 CMIP6 情景 SSP2-4.5 相比，大流行对 2020 年全球气溶胶辐射强迫的影响较小，与自然逐年变化相比很小。辐射预算。自然变化也限制了检测人为气溶胶辐射效应中有意义的区域差异的能力。我们确定了在过去几年受到严重污染的地区无云条件下发现地表辐射显着变化的最佳机会。大流行后的恢复情景表明，与工业化前相比，2050年气溶胶强迫的分布为-0.68至-0.38Wm ^-2 ，这意味着与2050年基线相比有+0.05至-0.25Wm ^-2的差异从SSP2-4.5。该分布属于当前气溶胶辐射强迫的不确定性和 21 世纪末气溶胶辐射强迫的 CMIP6 分布范围。我们发布新的 MACv2-SP 数据，用于研究大流行的气候响应和恢复情景。 我们对2050年的强迫估计表明，大流行后恢复期间气溶胶排放的持续减少会导致比2020年更强的气候响应，即大流行对气候的影响存在延迟。