Week1: Climate Change Flashcards
What’s in the atmosphere?
Gases, Clouds, H2O, pollutants(aerosols)
What do we need to consider?
- Ein = Eout
- We focus about energy balance between the atmosphere and earth surface
- Some of the radiation —> reflected back to the space and some got absorbed by the atmosphere
What is Greenhouse gases?
Some of the energy that trap in the atmosphere
What is black-body radiation?
Perfect absorber/ emitter of radiation
What is Albedo?
It is a measure of how reflective something is
What’s green house effect?
When incoming radiation amount is way larger than out going. (Radiation at the Top of atmosphere < Radiation at Earth’s surface)
What are the type of greenhouse gasses?
- Long-lived GHGs [CO2, CH4, N2O, CFCs, SF6]
- Short-lived GHGs [water vapor, O3]
- aerosols [Black carbon, SOx, OC, PM)
What is Radiative Forcing (RF)?
A measure of the net change in energy balance of the Earth system in response to external perturbation. (Warming or cooling effects of atmospheric components)
What is global warming potential (GWP)?
Compare integrated Radiation Forcing(RF) over a specified period from a unit mass pulse emission relative to CO2
What is 28x more potent than CO2 per kg means?
On 100 years time scale, 1 unit emission of methane gas would have 28 times the warming impact as the 1 unit CO2 gas emitted.
What are the impacts you can observe NZ climate change?
- increased temperatures
- warming oceans
- rising sea levels
- ocean acidification
What are the factors that cause global temperature to rise in NZ?
- Car dependency country
- Massive agricultural
- Located near equator
What are the impacts cause by the temperature rise?
- Decrease in cold nights
- Melting glaciers
- Change in precipitation (floods and droughts)
- Vulnerability of marine ecosystem —> leads to extinction of species
