Contrails cause significant atmospheric radiative effects.
The overwhelming body of scientific literature demonstrates that aviation contrails and contrail cirrus exert substantial positive radiative forcing, representing a major component of anthropogenic climate change. While some observational studies suggest models may occasionally overestimate these effects, the consensus strongly supports the conclusion that contrails cause significant atmospheric radiative forcing.
The retrieved papers overwhelmingly support the claim that contrails cause significant atmospheric radiative effects, with multiple studies quantifying their effective radiative forcing and identifying them as the dominant non-CO2 contribution to aviation's climate impact. A few papers discuss uncertainties, modeling limitations, or potential overestimations (such as paper [4]), but the vast majority of studies (0, 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11) confirm the significance of contrail radiative forcing.
Lee DS, Fahey DW, Skowron A, Allen MR, Burkhardt U, Chen Q, Doherty SJ, Freeman S, Forster PM, Fuglestvedt J, Gettelman A, De León RR, Lim LL, Lund MT, Millar RJ, Owen B, Penner JE, Pitari G, Prather MJ, Sausen R, Wilcox LJ. The contribution of global aviation to anthropogenic climate forcing for 2000 to 2018.. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2020.117834
Contrail cirrus is identified as yielding the largest positive net effective radiative forcing term among aviation climate impacts.
Digby RAR, Gillett NP, Monahan AH, Cole JNS. An Observational Constraint on Aviation-Induced Cirrus From the COVID-19-Induced Flight Disruption.. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021gl095882
Satellite observations during pandemic flight reductions suggest that previous model-based estimates may overestimate aviation-induced cirrus warming.
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Kärcher B. Formation and radiative forcing of contrail cirrus.. 2018. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-04068-0
Aircraft-produced contrail cirrus clouds are recognized as contributing significantly to anthropogenic climate change.
Sacchi R, Becattini V, Gabrielli P, Cox B, Dirnaichner A, Bauer C, Mazzotti M. How to make climate-neutral aviation fly.. 2023. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-39749-y
Non-CO2 climate impacts, driven heavily by contrails, account for up to 80% of aviation's total climate footprint.
Marius Bickel, Michael Ponater, Ulrike Burkhardt, Mattia Righi, Johannes Hendricks, Patrick Jöckel. Contrail Cirrus Climate Impact: From Radiative Forcing to Surface Temperature Change. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli-d-24-0245.1
Global climate model simulations confirm that contrail cirrus exerts substantial radiative forcing, although efficacy parameters vary.
Miller TR, Chertow M, Hertwich E. Liquid Hydrogen: A Mirage or Potent Solution for Aviation's Climate Woes?. 2023. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.2c06286
Contrail cirrus makes up a large majority of combustion climate impacts for alternative fuels like liquid hydrogen.
Seelig T, Wolf K, Bellouin N, Tesche M. Quantification of the radiative forcing of contrails embedded in cirrus clouds.. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-66231-8
Embedded contrails are found to be a non-negligible contributor to aviation's overall radiative forcing impact on climate.
Petzold A, Khan NF, Li Y, Spichtinger P, Rohs S, Crewell S, Wahner A, Krämer M. Most long-lived contrails form within cirrus clouds with uncertain climate impact.. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-65532-2
Contrails within specific cloud cover regions are shown to cause significant additional warming.
Schumann U, Bugliaro L, Dörnbrack A, Baumann R, Voigt C. Aviation Contrail Cirrus and Radiative Forcing Over Europe During 6 Months of COVID-19.. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021gl092771
Modeled instantaneous radiative contrail forcing shows large regional drops when air traffic declines.
Boerboom L, Rao AG, Grewe V, Yin F. A comprehensive well-to-wake climate impact assessment of sustainable aviation fuel.. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-13445-x
Inflight non-CO2 emissions and contrails are crucial factors that significantly increase the total global warming effects of aviation.
Rap A, Zhang W, Feng W, Dray L, Dessens O, Marsh D, Gettelman A, Forster P. Strong simulated reductions in contrail cirrus effective radiative forcing from alternative fuels. 2026. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-9853842/v1
Global assessments demonstrate that contrail cirrus produces substantial baseline effective radiative forcing that alternative fuels aim to mitigate.
Ortiz I, Dimitropoulou E, de Buyl P, Clerbaux N, gent Jv, Brenot H, García-Heras J, Soler M. Observation-Based Assessment of Contrail Climate Effects across the Euro-Atlantic Region in 2023. 2026. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-9370812/v1
Observation-based frameworks confirm that aviation contrails drive a dominant and highly concentrated share of regional climate warming.
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