Climatic Effect of the Greenhouse Gases Clusterization

Abstract

The Earth's atmosphere is a complex dynamic system, which protects the biosphere. One of the significant factors impacting the Earth's radiation balance is the greenhouse effect. The ability of the atmosphere to capture and recycle energy emitted by the Earth’s surface is the defining characteristic of the greenhouse effect. Greenhouse gases (GHG) dissipate heat in the atmosphere. The greenhouse effect is observed only when radiant heat stays in the troposphere, instead of leaving into Space. Layers lying above the troposphere, such as stratosphere and thermosphere, serve as an obstacle for heat loss into Space. At low temperatures, characteristic of stratosphere and the lower thermosphere, water clusters, capable of absorbing molecules of other gases are formed. Many chemical compounds present in Earth's atmosphere behave as greenhouse gases. The fact that the Earth’s climate is altered by a change in atmospheric composition is well known. The analyses of various paleorecords, such as ice cores, have shown that atmospheric composition and climate have been correlated over the past 100,000 years. Water Vapor is the most abundant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. However, changes in its concentration is also considered to be a result of climate feedbacks related to the warming of the atmosphere rather than a direct result of industrialization. The feedback loop in which water is involved is critically important to projecting future climate change, but as yet is still fairly poorly measured and understood. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, and the increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere must influence earth's radiation balance. The rising concentration of atmospheric CO2 in the last century is not consistent with supply from anthropogenic sources. Such anthropogenic sources account for less than 5% of the present atmosphere, compared to the major input/output from natural sources (~95%). Hence, anthropogenic CO2 is too small to be a significant or relevant factor in the global warming process, particularly when comparing with the far more potent greenhouse gas water vapor. The rising atmospheric CO2 is the outcome of rising temperature rather than vice versa. The time taken for atmospheric gases to adjust to changes in sources or sinks is known as the atmospheric lifetime of a gas. The atmospheric lifetime of carbon dioxide is estimated as 5200 years (Essenhigh, 2009). An individual molecule of CO2 has a short residence time in the atmosphere. However, in most cases when a molecule of CO2 leaves the atmosphere it is simply swapping places with one in the ocean. The CO2 molecules cannot accumulate in the atmosphere, because of Henry's Law, which says that most of the atmospheric CO2 must be