MET 112 Global Climate Change

Activities

Dr. Eugene Cordero

San Jose State University

2 MET 112 Global Climate MET 112 Global Climate ChangeChange

You are watching your favorite news program (i.e. CNN, BBC or NBC) and they are reporting on a massive heat wave that is crippling the Midwest. The news reporter states that this event is clearly a result of climate change. Your roommate laughs and remarks that the news reporter is ‘full of it’. Who is right and why?

Form group of two – names on the top of the paper

Activity 0

Activity 1

Answer each question and turn in at the beginning of next class (Feb 7th)

1. If the earth’s albedo was to increase due to more clouds, how would the Earth’s temperature change?

2. Today, greenhouse gases like CO2 are increasing in the atmosphere. How would you expect that would change the earth’s temperature.

3. If the earth’s temperature cools by 3C, how much is that in degrees F?

Activity 2 Greenhouse Effect

Draw a diagram showing how the earth is heated by the Sun.

Include arrows and/or lines to indicate the ‘Energy Balance” of the earth.

Energy Balance – Energy coming in and energy going out.

Clouds, and reflected energy

Climate Game Climate Game Names ___________________________Names ___________________________

Match the city with the corresponding climatology Match the city with the corresponding climatology by indicating the appropriate letterby indicating the appropriate letter

Sacramento, California (38°°N) _____________ Phoenix, Arizona (33Phoenix, Arizona (33°°N)N) __________________________ Denver, Colorado (40Denver, Colorado (40°°N)N) __________________________ Iquitos, Peru (4Iquitos, Peru (4°°S)S) __________________________ Mobile, Alabama (30°°N) _____________ Winnipeg, Canada (50°°N) _____________ Fairbanks, Alaska (65°°N) _____________

Draw a concept map using the following terms. You may add additional terms if you wish.

Water vapor Ice Liquid water Condensation Evaporation Gas High Cloud Low Cloud Precipitation Condensation nuclei Temperature Warming Cooling Air

Activity 3: Water Concept Map

Activity 4

Consider the fact that today, the perihelion of the Earth’s orbit around the sun occurs in the Northern Hemisphere winter. In 11,000 years, the perihelion will occur during Northern Hemisphere summer. A) Explain how the climate (i.e. temperature of summer compared to temperature of winter) of the Northern Hemisphere would change in 11,000 years just due to the precession.

B) How would this affect the presence of Northern Hemisphere glaciers (growing or decaying)?

Activity 5: Questions from our Internet Readings. Answer each

question in 2-3 sentences.

1. What is the main point Hal Harvey is making in regard the economics of combating global warming?

2. How and why is Sweden planning to be world’s first oil free economy?

3. Who is James Hansen and what are the circumstances surrounding him, NASA and the Bush administration?

Activity 6

Imagine the Earth was to warm for some reason (initiating mechanism or perturbation)

A) Identify two positive feedbacks that would influence the earth’s climate and explain how each one works.

B) Identify two negative feedbacks that would influence the earth’s climate and explain how each one works.

C) Rank each feedback by its strength (which one is the strongest) and explain your reasoning.

D) Which feedback do you think is more uncertain. Explain your reasoning.

Activity (groups of two) – clicker

Imagine that the global temperature were to increase significantly for some reason.

1. How would the silicate-to-carbonate conversion process change during this warming period. Explain.

2. How would this affect atmospheric CO2 levels and as a result, global temperature?

3. What type of feedback process would this be and why (positive or negative)?

Activity 7

Answer the following questions in groups of 2 (new partner please!)

1. Plot out a graph of how you would expect the temperature of daisyworld to change as solar luminosity increases from 0.5 to 1.5 (plot, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8, …1.4, 1.5) without any daisies on the planet.

2. Graph the temperature versus solar luminosity for daisyworld with daisies (from computer program)

3. Explain how the daisies influenced the temperature. Hint: Describe the relationship between the albedo, black daisies, white daisies and the temperature.

4. If it takes 1 billion years for the solar luminosity to increase by 0.1, then for how many years are the daisies alive on daisyworld?

5. If daisies could not influence climate, then for how many years would daisies be alive on daisyworld?

6. What conclusions might you come up with in regards to how the daisies affected climate?

7. Describe the feedback processes that occur during this experiment. Hint: there may be more than one!