Climate Change

Question 1

What is climate?

Answer 1

The broad composite average of the conditions of the region, measured in terms of temperature, precipitation

Question 2

What does Earth’s temperature depend on?

Answer 2

The balance between energy entering and leaving the planet’s system.

Question 3

What happens if incoming energy from the sun is absorbed?

Answer 3

Earth get’s warmer

Question 4

What happens if absorbed energy is released back into space?

Answer 4

Earth get’s cooler

Question 5

What are four ways to change the climate?

Answer 5

1.) Change how heat moves around the planet.
2.) Vary in the sun’s energy reaching earth
3.) Changes in the reflectivity of Earth’s atmosphere and surface.
4.)Changes in the greenhouse effect, affect the amount of heat retained by Earth’s atmosphere.

Question 6

Where does ocean circulation change?

Answer 6

heat is moved/stored in the planet

Question 7

What drives ocean circulation ?

Answer 7

plate tectonics

Question 8

How does ocean circulation effect climate?

Answer 8

Slows changes in climate

Question 9

What are plate tectonics?

Answer 9

Slow changes, imperceptible at human time scale. Large magnitude over geologic time.

Question 10

What is eccentricity?

Answer 10

How ovicalar the rotation of the earth is around the sun. The shape of the earth’s orbit.

Question 11

What is obliquity?

Answer 11

The tilt of the earth’s axis

Question 12

What is precession?

Answer 12

The wooble of the earths axis

Question 13

How does tilt change seasons?

Answer 13

It changes the pattern of solar radiation making one hemisphere warmer and the other colder.

Question 14

What does precession do at solstices?

Answer 14

Changes the distance from earth and sun at solstices.

Question 15

When does the Milankovitch cycle change?

Answer 15

It changes seasonally, specifically the length and intensity of seasons.

Question 16

How do we measure past climate?

Answer 16

Climate proxies

Question 17

What are climate proxies?

Answer 17

Preserved physical characteristics that enable scientists to reconstruct the climate conditions over a longer fraction of Earth’s history.

Question 18

What are the climate proxies that are used?

Answer 18

Ice cores
Pollen
Tree rings
Coral Reefs
Sediment cores

Question 19

How is an ice core used as a climate proxy?

Answer 19

Changes is 016 and 018 ratio is a proxie for temperature.

Question 20

How is pollen used as a climate proxy?

Answer 20

Plants and trees have distinct ranges of ‘tolerance’ based on climatic conditions: Changes to this change the vegetation.

Question 21

How are tree rings used as a climate proxy?

Answer 21

Thickness controlled by climatic growing conditions: also records fires

Question 22

How are coral reefs used as a climate proxy?

Answer 22

As they grow, coral records info about the temperature and composition of the water.

Question 23

How are sediment cores used as a climate proxy?

Answer 23

Sediment layers can indicate changes in deposition throughout time.

Question 24

What are some issues with climate proxies?

Answer 24

temporal resolution (time)

spatial distribution issues

Question 25

What is the greenhouse effect?

Answer 25

Warming, of the atmosphere, is caused by certain gases, primarily co2 & ch4

Question 26

What do climate models do?

Answer 26

Take past observations, and attempt to make future predictions.

Question 27

What is Earth’s climate system?

Answer 27

Consists of interaction between the atmosphere, water, ice, land, and vegetation.