Earth closest to the sun in January at 147 million km at point called Perihelion
(peri:close)
Farthest from the sun at 152 million km at point called aphelion (ap:far away)
Variation in rad intensity of 7% between the two points
Heat capacity of air is twice that of land while heat capacity of water is 60x that of
land.
Daily variation in air temp controlled by net rad which is the balance
between incoming and outgoing solar and infrared radiation
Where incoming radiation exceeds outgoing radiation, the net
radiation is positive creating a sensible heat flux into the air and the
air temperature rises.
Because air is a poor conductor the initial heating only affects air next to
ground
As energy accumulates convection begins and heats higher portions of the
atmosphere
The atmosphere continues to warm after the noon hour. Max temp is reached
between 3-5 PM.
However when outgoing energy exceeds incoming energy, net rad is
neg so the air loses sensible heat to the surface and the air temp
falls with temperature at its coolest just before sunrise
Continentality
Contributes to cooling
Textbook notes
Ch. 5, summary on pg 118
UV rad: 0,1-0.4 um
Visible rad:0.4-0.7um
Infrared rad:0.7-100 um
As sun angle decreases the amount of solar rad striking a surface will
decrease due to two reasons
Given amount of rad will be spread over an increasingly larger area and
the solar beam will experience greater depletion due to a longer path
length
Chapter 6
4 factors that determine a planets temp
Solar output
Distance from the sun
Albedo and
Greenhouse effect
sensible heat will flow from the surface to the ground by conduction
sensible heat will flow from the surface to the atmosphere by
convection and
latent heat will flow to the atmosphere by convection as water
evaporates at the surface and condenses in the air
As a result of night time radiative deficit, the surface will cool and