GEOG 1101 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Subduction, Rain Shadow, Köppen Climate Classification
Document Summary
Plate tectonics states that earths outer layer, the lithosphere consists of large geologic platforms or plates that move very slowly across its surface. Divergent plate boundaries are those where plates move apart. Convergent plate boundaries are plates that move towards one another. Transformer plate boundaries are two plates grinding laterally past one another. Subduction zone is when one plate sinks below another. This exists off the coast of south america. 250 million years ago all the worlds land masses were tightly consolidated onto a supercontinent called. It was broken up as convection cells moved the tectonic plates apart. Solar energy- the sun heating the earth and its atmosphere. Incoming short wave solar energy is called insolation, it passes back through the atmosphere and is absorbed by earths land and water surfaces. As these surfaces warm they reradiate heat back into the lower atmosphere as infrared long wave energy. The natural process of atmospheric heating is known as the greenhouse effect.
