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    Earth's Energy Budget

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    Sunay Mehta
    The Earth's energy budget is the net balance of incoming and outgoing radiation. About 30% of incoming solar energy is reflected by clouds, aerosols, and surfaces like snow and ice. The Earth radiates infrared energy based on its temperature. Any change in the energy entering or leaving Earth will affect global temperatures, as life depends on a narrow temperature range. The tropics absorb more solar energy than poles, so ocean and air currents redistribute heat to maintain balance. The water cycle also depends on the energy budget to evaporate water and cause precipitation.

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    Earth's Energy Budget

    Uploaded by

    Sunay Mehta
    155 views4 pages
    The Earth's energy budget is the net balance of incoming and outgoing radiation. About 30% of incoming solar energy is reflected by clouds, aerosols, and surfaces like snow and ice. The Earth radiates infrared energy based on its temperature. Any change in the energy entering or leaving Earth will affect global temperatures, as life depends on a narrow temperature range. The tropics absorb more solar energy than poles, so ocean and air currents redistribute heat to maintain balance. The water cycle also depends on the energy budget to evaporate water and cause precipitation.

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    Earth's Energy Budget

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    The Earth's energy budget is the net balance of incoming and outgoing radiation. About 30% of incoming solar energy is reflected by clouds, aerosols, and surfaces like snow and ice. The Earth radiates infrared energy based on its temperature. Any change in the energy entering or leaving Earth will affect global temperatures, as life depends on a narrow temperature range. The tropics absorb more solar energy than poles, so ocean and air currents redistribute heat to maintain balance. The water cycle also depends on the energy budget to evaporate water and cause precipitation.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    155 views4 pages

    Earth's Energy Budget

    Uploaded by

    Sunay Mehta
    The Earth's energy budget is the net balance of incoming and outgoing radiation. About 30% of incoming solar energy is reflected by clouds, aerosols, and surfaces like snow and ice. The Earth radiates infrared energy based on its temperature. Any change in the energy entering or leaving Earth will affect global temperatures, as life depends on a narrow temperature range. The tropics absorb more solar energy than poles, so ocean and air currents redistribute heat to maintain balance. The water cycle also depends on the energy budget to evaporate water and cause precipitation.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    of 4

    Earth’s Energy Budget

    Introduction

    Earth’s Energy Budget is the net balance of radiant energy that reaches
    Earth from the sun and the energy that flows from Earth back out to space
    (Inflow-Outflow).

    Energy from the sun is mostly in the visible portion of the electromagnetic
    spectrum. However, all the energy reaching the Earth from the Sun doesn’t
    make it to the Earth. About 30 percent of the sun’s incoming energy is
    reflected back to outer space by clouds, atmospheric molecules, tiny
    suspended particles called aerosols, and the Earth’s land, snow and ice
    surfaces (white surfaces reflect most of the energy incident on it). The
    Earth itself also gives out thermal radiant energy to space as infrared
    energy. The intensity of thermal emission from a surface depends upon its
    temperature.

    It accounts for the balance between the energy that Earth receives from


    the Sun, and the energy the Earth radiates back into outer space after
    having been distributed throughout the five components of Earth's climate
    system. This system is made up of Earth's water, ice, atmosphere, rocky
    crust, and all living things.

    Importance of Studying the Earth’s Energy Budget

    Any change is the quantum of heat or energy entering or leaving Earth will
    directly affect the temperature on Earth, Since, most life forms depend on a
    thin range of temperature to thrive and flourish, any changes in the Earth’s
    moderate temperatures, either upwards or downwards, can trigger
    ecosystem disruptions.

    Earth’s energy budget can change through natural activities like volcanoes
    and snow storms, or through man-made ones like carbon emissions and
    industrial pollutants into rivers and air. All these things may cause the
    Earth to increase or decrease the temperature to restore this balance.

    Geographically, as well, there are wide variations in the difference between


    the energy absorbed and radiated back into space. For example, the tropics
    absorb more energy, being at a closer distance to the Sun than the poles,
    which are further away. Now, to restore this balance the Earth must
    arbitrage this energy from one place to the other. The Earth makes use of
    its vast network of oceans and seas and high atmosphere. Oceanic or sea,
    and air currents drive heat from local heat hotspots to more cooler places.
    It’s also on these hot and cold, air and sea currents that many animals and
    plants depend on. Any disruptions on one area of the globe has domino
    effects on the biosphere and the geographies of this planet.

    Even the Earth’s most important phenomenon, The Water Cycle depends
    on the Earth’s Energy Budget. It is the constant insolation of radiation that
    provides the requisite energy for water to evaporate, form clouds and
    cause rain and snowfall on different parts of this planet.
    Every element of the water cycle is important for energy preservation. The
    water, when evaporates and forms clouds, stays in the form of water
    vapour or small droplets suspended in air. The vapours and droplets act
    gives greenhouse effect and hold an important percentage of global heat
    reserve within them. In fact, the high specific heat capacity of water also
    helps in doing this. Therefore, it is important to preserve the sanctity of the
    Water Cycle as well, by not pollution our seas and rivers or resorting to
    poor farming practices- one of the major disruptors to the Water Cycle.
    Fig. Detailed diagram showing incoming and outgoing energy in a balanced example of Earth's
    energy budget, with incoming and outgoing values of 341 W/m 2. General flows of energy on the
    surface and in the atmosphere are shown as well

    Exploring the Budget

    The condition of radiation equilibrium is the one in which the flow of


    heat to space is equal to incoming insolation.
    The radiation emitted back averages about to 340 watts of solar power
    per square meter. Any increase or decrease in this amount will lead to
    change in global temperatures, triggering hysteria.
    These changes in temperature are not brought about instantaneously
    but depend on a number of factors.
    There is still a very little net gain or loss of energy despite of the enormous
    transfers of energy into and from the earth and it maintains a relatively
    constant temperature. The Earth emits the same amount of energy via
    atmospheric and terrestrial radiation to space as it receives via insolation.

    Statistically, approximately 35% is reflected back from Earth’s diverse and


    largely low albedo terrain, and the rest 65% of solar power is absorbed and
    then eventually radiated back too, thus maintaining zero net gain of energy
    by the earth.

    The Role of the Earth’s Surface

    The amount of energy reflected by a surface is called Albedo and is


    measured as a value between 0 to 1.
    a. Very dark colours have an albedo close to 0, meaning they absorb more
    heat than reflect
    b. Very light colours have an albedo close to 1, meaning they reflect more
    heat than absorb.

    Because much of the land surface and oceans are dark in colour, they have
    a low albedo. They absorb a large amount of the solar energy that gets to
    them, reflecting only a small fraction of it. Forests have low albedo, near
    0.15. Snow and ice, on the other hand, are very light in colour. They have
    very high albedo, as high as 0.8 or 0.9, and reflect most of the solar energy
    that gets to them, absorbing very little.

    References

    1.  IPCC AR5 WG1 Glossary 2013 "energy budget"


    2.  IPCC AR5 WG1 Glossary 2013 "climate system"
    3. https://www.nasa.gov/feature/langley/what-is-earth-s-energy-budget-five-questions-with-a-guy-
    who-knows

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