3 ms·
The amount of heat in the atmosphere at any point doesn't really matter all that much for global warming. What matters is the break-even point between the amoun
by dan_mctree 5y ago
The amount of heat in the atmosphere at any point doesn't really matter all that much for global warming. What matters is the break-even point between the amount of energy we gain from and lose to space. Since the earth emits more energy if it's warmer (black body radiation), the break-even point relates to the temperature of the earth. If we change something about the earth's in or output of energy, the earth's temperature will naturally rise until the break even point is reached again.
By introducing greenhouse gasses, we are affecting earth's ability to radiate energy to space and thus the temperature at which we have our break-even point. Should all greenhouse gasses disappear, the earth would rapidly start cooling until it reaches its new break-even point.
- gmuslera 5y agoWe aren't talking about a system with an evenly distributed energy. It wouldn't be life on Earth if the global temperature average was between what is now the temperature of the atmosphere, and all the ones below surface. As long as the thermal isolation remains in place it shouldn't be a problem and the biggest foe should be the unbalance between heat in and heat out from sun/space, but what if we do a big scale and sustained thermal transfer between the core and the surface? I know, I'm oversimplifying a lot, and the orders of what humans can do may be dwarfed by any volcanic eruption, but it should be a safe margin at some point at which the scale and time of heat transfer with underground may start to affect global average temperature.