I'll re-post this for those that haven't seen it.
I'll re-post this for those that haven't seen it.
To get a good understanding of the greenhouse effect, you have to look at reflection and wavelength, and/or by looking at the Earth's energy balance
Most of our heat comes from the sun, but a smaller share comes from the internal heat of the earth, but the internal heat from inside the earth is reasonably consistent and can be ignored for the sake of this argument. Stored heat is also important, and that, for example, explains why the lowest sunshine day of the year (December 21) isn't the coldest day of the year, but to keep this reasonably short, lets ignore stored heat too.
The heat in / heat out balance works kind of like this:
71% of the energy we get from the sun warms the earth, 29% is directly reflected back into space.
Of that 71%, 59% is returned to space from the atmosphere and just 12% is returned to space from the surface. That's the atmospheric blanket effect in a sense. Most of the heat, in the form of infra-red light has to travel through the atmosphere to leave the earth and the greenhouse effect reflects that light, just like colored dye in water reflects light, where clear water mostly lets light pass through it.
Atmospheric circulation plays a role too, so do clouds, but lets ignore that for now as well. The greenhouse effect, caused by CO2 or other greenhouse gas, H20 or CH4 (H20 in clouds is different, that's tiny ice particles), but water vapor, which, in the air is invisible to our eyes. They work in essentially the same way as putting colored dye in water, the colored water absorbed and reflects more light than clear water, and the sky, to infrared light, is opaque with greenhouse gas. That Opaqueness can only be removed by reducing the amount of greenhouse gas. It can't be removed by adding other gas, so the greenhouse effect is essentially, directly tied to the total amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere.
What Greenhouse gas does is it affects the 12% and 59%, and the rate and way that heat leaves the earth. If heat leaves the earth more slowly, the earth gradually warms.
What "global cooling" gases do, doesn't undo what greenhouse gas does. That's not possible, any more than it's possible to make a dye in water stop being opaque by adding another color.
Global cooling gases do exist, but they work in a different way, by affecting the 71%-29% ratio.
Volcanic gas, for example, raises the 29% of immediate reflection and that cools the earth. Volcanic cooling however is quite temporary, lasting a few years at most, but that's basically the gist of things, what reflective to visible light gases can be used to raise the 29% so that the thicker blanket of greenhouse gas is counteracted.
From the web site Earth Science Stack Exchange
I'll re-post this for those that haven't seen it.
To get a good understanding of the greenhouse effect, you have to look at reflection and wavelength, and/or by looking at the Earth's energy balance
Most of our heat comes from the sun, but a smaller share comes from the internal heat of the earth, but the internal heat from inside the earth is reasonably consistent and can be ignored for the sake of this argument. Stored heat is also important, and that, for example, explains why the lowest sunshine day of the year (December 21) isn't the coldest day of the year, but to keep this reasonably short, lets ignore stored heat too.
The heat in / heat out balance works kind of like this:
71% of the energy we get from the sun warms the earth, 29% is directly reflected back into space.
Of that 71%, 59% is returned to space from the atmosphere and just 12% is returned to space from the surface. That's the atmospheric blanket effect in a sense. Most of the heat, in the form of infra-red light has to travel through the atmosphere to leave the earth and the greenhouse effect reflects that light, just like colored dye in water reflects light, where clear water mostly lets light pass through it.
Atmospheric circulation plays a role too, so do clouds, but lets ignore that for now as well. The greenhouse effect, caused by CO2 or other greenhouse gas, H20 or CH4 (H20 in clouds is different, that's tiny ice particles), but water vapor, which, in the air is invisible to our eyes. They work in essentially the same way as putting colored dye in water, the colored water absorbed and reflects more light than clear water, and the sky, to infrared light, is opaque with greenhouse gas. That Opaqueness can only be removed by reducing the amount of greenhouse gas. It can't be removed by adding other gas, so the greenhouse effect is essentially, directly tied to the total amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere.
What Greenhouse gas does is it affects the 12% and 59%, and the rate and way that heat leaves the earth. If heat leaves the earth more slowly, the earth gradually warms.
What "global cooling" gases do, doesn't undo what greenhouse gas does. That's not possible, any more than it's possible to make a dye in water stop being opaque by adding another color.
Global cooling gases do exist, but they work in a different way, by affecting the 71%-29% ratio.
Volcanic gas, for example, raises the 29% of immediate reflection and that cools the earth. Volcanic cooling however is quite temporary, lasting a few years at most, but that's basically the gist of things, what reflective to visible light gases can be used to raise the 29% so that the thicker blanket of greenhouse gas is counteracted.
From the web site Earth Science Stack Exchange