weather vs climate

Question 1

weather vs climate

Answer 1

• weather = short term prevailing conditions in the atmosphere at a particular place/time
• climate = long term patterns of weather in a particular area

Question 2

weather predictions

Answer 2

• hard to predict as influenced by many factors
• few days in advance

Question 3

climate predictions

Answer 3

• based on long term trends/averages
• can predict over decades
• improvements due to increase in computing power for modelling

Question 4

atmosphere ocean general circulation models (AOGCMs)

Answer 4

• requires data about oceans, atmosphere, topography, cryosphere, biosphere, carbon/water cycling
• earth subdivided into boxes where calculations on interactions between factors can be made

Question 5

representative concentration pathways

Answer 5

• prediction of future climate and global surface temperatures based on different carbon emission scenarios
• can be incorporated into aogcms