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