EOSC 112 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Snowball Earth, Mesozoic, Oceanic Basin

• School: UBC
• Department: Earth and Ocean Sciences
• Course: EOSC 112
• Professor: Debeare Bart

Document Summary

Ea(cid:396)th"s al(cid:271)edo a(cid:374)d its i(cid:373)pa(cid:272)t o(cid:374) the lo(cid:374)g-term evolution of climate. In reference to the graph in the slides, the red are the warming parameters and blue represent the cooling parameters. The scale at the bottom is in w/m2 and indicates that the warming and cooling effects produced by each process is equivalent to having a decrease/increase in incoming solar radiation. Increase in cloud cover and aerosol has a larger cooling effect but the total effect is uncertain. These uncertainties make the future climate more difficult to predict. Albedo refers to the fraction of incident solar radiation that is directly reflected to outer space, the reflection depends on the type of surface. Clicker: (cid:449)hi(cid:272)h o(cid:374)e of these fa(cid:272)to(cid:396)s does (cid:374)ot i(cid:374)flue(cid:374)(cid:272)e ea(cid:396)th"s al(cid:271)edo, t(cid:396)i(cid:272)k (cid:395)uestio(cid:374), sea le(cid:448)el, positio(cid:374) of (cid:272)o(cid:374)ti(cid:374)e(cid:374)ts, ea(cid:396)th"s te(cid:373)pe(cid:396)atu(cid:396)e all influence the albedo. High sea level = more water in ice sheets, which in returns reflects radiation back.