Week 14

  • Greenhouse gases: 
    • a gas that absorbs and re-emits infrared light 
  • Earth's "blanket" and light
    • Certain gases in our atmosphere act like a blanket around the Earth
    • Light rays coming from the sun contain visible photons (energetic light particles) 
      • Visible photons are absorbed by Earths' surface and re-emitted as infrared photons
      • We feel infrared photons as heat 
  • Albedo effect
    • The reflectivity of a surface; how much radiation is reflected vs. absorbed
    • COLOR has a major influence on albedo
    • a high albedo means something is more reflective, a low albedo means it is less reflective/will absorb more radiation 
    • albedo = 1 ; completely reflects radiation
    • albedo = 2; completely absorbed radiation
  • Snowball Earth
  • The Atmosphere is dynamic
    • dust is transported from the Saharan Desert to the Amazon Basin
    • air pollutants from China arrive at the coast of California 
  • Donora, PA, 1948 
  • Great London Smog of 1952
  • Technologies developed to reduce emissions from power plants 
    • Cottrell precipitator 
    • flue gas desulfurization 

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