Climate Forcing

Climate forcing has to do with the amount of energy we receive from the sun, and the amount of energy we radiate back into space. Variances in climate forcing are determined by physical influences on the atmosphere such as orbital and axial changes as well as the amount of greenhouse gas in our atmosphere.

Climate Forcing

NASA/GISS Climate Forcing & Temperature

Understanding climate forcing is actually easy. Force is generally understood as strength or energy, the cause of motion or change, or active power. This could be a person pushing a shopping cart or an engine that powers a car. For example, gravitational force is how the moons gravity causes the tides to change. Radiative forcing caused by greenhouse gases in our atmosphere keeps the earth from being a frozen ball in space, because the sun provides energy, and the greenhouse gases in our atmosphere trap the heat on earth... a positive forcing.

That's it!

To understand the climate forcing, you just add all the components of forcing that are positive and negative and you end up with a view of the total forcing in the climate system of earth.

In our case, the sun provides our heat energy, the Milankovitch forcing is the general regulator of climate forcing over 100k year time scales. That combined with terrestrial components, such as greenhouse gases, aerosols, land use

Energy absorption (how much energy we get form the sun) and energy radiation (how much we radiate back out into space) part of the climate system. According the the Stefan Boltzmann Law, we receive on earth 240 W/m2 and we radiate the same back to space.

Earth regulators include thermal inertia of the ocean, land use, and greenhouse gases & aerosols in the atmosphere. These things determine the speed of climate change in combination with the above factors, in general.

Some of the effects are faster and some are slower.

All these parts of the system, once measured and modeled reasonably give you an idea of the amount of forcing each imposes on the climate system. Some forces are positive and others are negative.

Radiative Forcing NASA/GISS

NASA/GISS

Links

General

Climate sensitivity:

Aerosols:

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