Questions tagged [climate]
Average weather conditions for a particular area measured over multiple years or decades. For questions on climate change use the [climate-change] tag.
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Dedicated book to understand climate and ocean science
Let me explain: I am a physics student who did some basic earth science during my early high school days. But thinking about earth science makes me very curious about deeper topics, like how the ...
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Why is geothermal heat insignificant to surface temperature?
I believe the temperature gradient underground is as high as 30°C per kilometer of depth. Thus, it is very warm only 1 kilometer below the Earth's surface. Yet, it is commonly stated that geothermal ...
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Ocean oscillations with long time periods
I heard that some ocean oscillations act on a time scale of a millennium. Is this true, or at least argued by some oceanographers? If so, what are they and what causes them? If not, what are the ...
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“Coastal regions experience moderate climate”. What size are these regions?
It’s common knowledge (and I’m expecting correct) that coastal regions experience moderate climate. But how far is the coastal region affected?
Does this affect people sitting on the beach? The ...
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What are some places that have never recorded an "ice day" nor a "tropical night"?
An ice day is a day on which the maximum temperature doesn't exceed 0 °C and a tropical night is a night on which the minimum temperature exceeds 20 °C. Probably no part of the tropics has experienced ...
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Rossby waves in the atmosphere
I have trouble understanding the Rossby waves in the atmosphere.
Sometimes they are said to be caused by the jets moving from west to east. But the phase velocity of the waves is in the west direction ...
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If all land mass was desert would the world be hotter or colder than it is now?
Its normally said that deserts cool planets because they reflect more radiation back to space. According to this logic if all the land mass in the world was desert the world should be colder.
Is it ...
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What are the next meteorology breakthroughs? [closed]
It seems to me that not much attention is given to meteorology these days. I am wondering if this is because it is an almost "solved" science in terms of what could be possibly known and ...
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How has the earth's temperature stayed relatively stable despite all the heat released in the atmosphere by humans? [duplicate]
If one considers the sum total of human heat emissions, especially over the last 3 centuries, the temperature increase over the time period does not seem to be commensurate. What gives? What self ...
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How much shifts the Subtropical high zone from 30 degrees during seasons?
The Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) is a band of low pressure that runs around the planet Earth; The Polar front is the Arctic band of low pressure that run around 60° N and south.
Both those ...
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On the occurrence of 'two summers' on certain regions of the Earth
My conception is that the two factors affecting seasons should be the following:
The relative duration of day and night throughout one rotation
The angle made by the sunlight w.r.t the normal to the ...
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Daily data for snow water equivalent (not including rain)
Do you know a way to find daily snow water equivalent data, for just snow and not any rain that may have fallen same day?
Backstory:
Hi, I'm pretty new to all this. I work for a small city that wants ...
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Why do clouds have positive climate feedback although they have a cooling net effect?
In a lecture we learned that instantaneously removing all clouds from earth would give radiation forcing of about 18W/m² [1], leading to significant warming. So clouds, in simple words, cool the earth ...
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Is good rainfall in the UK the result of being a small island surrounded by large moving seas, having mountains and trapped salt [closed]
If the mountains were levelled and salt removed would the country experience as much rainfall?
Context
Damp in houses:
Salt absorbs moisture: think of plaster walls that grow mould from proximity to a ...
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is there any site a layman can understand excess rain (floods) and earth warming
I am not a scientist but I am interested in the effects of global warming on the envirand would like to read more in a layman form.
I have read where global warming - hotter earth surface temperature ...
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What are the main differences between the reference temperature and the average air temperature?
Last week when I was dealing with the North American Multi-Model Ensemble (NMME) seasonal forecasting system, a variable named “tref,” or Reference Temperature, caught my attention.
I read some ...
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IPCC AR6 References
Does the IPCC publish its references (i.e. the references used in the report, not citations for the reports or chapters themselves) beyond what is in the PDFs of the reports themselves?
I'm looking ...
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Approximating Soil Moisture level
Are there any simple models to approximate soil moisture level (%) as a function of distance from a waterbody (say a lake)? If one assigns saturation level of lake to 100% , then are there any ...
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What is the definition for a hyper-humid area?
We can use the aridity index $\left ( ai = \dfrac{P}{PET} \right )$ to define arid areas. Hyperarid areas have $ai < 0.05$. Is there a similar threshold for hyper-humid regions?
Would it be 20 (...
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Why are rainy seasons different in different locations?
I noticed that the Middle East's rainy season generally runs from November to May; but Florida, which is at almost the same latitude, is exactly the opposite, peaking from May to November. Can anyone ...
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What was the physical environment like in the Fertile Cresent between 10k BCE and 1 CE?
Mesopotamia was part of the Fertile Crescent, and Assur was an Assyrian city in Mesopotamia for roughly 1500 years, but it looks like this now (barely any vegetation, pure desert):
What was the ...
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How do I calculate the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) phase from RMM1 & RMM2? [closed]
I want to calculate the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) phase by myself using Real-time Multivariate MJO series 1 (RMM1) and 2 (RMM2) from a data file.
The formula for doing so is:
$MJO phase = \...
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What is the current atmospheric concentration of $\small\sf{CO_2}$ in the atmosphere in atm (or bar)?
For some reason, I can only find the answer in ppm and I don’t know how to do this conversion.
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Why do the isotherms bulge north of the Bering Strait in winter, and bulge south of the Bering Strait in summer?
My grade-7 geography textbook contains these world average temperatures for January and July.
Average air temperatures in January (winter in the northern hemisphere)
Average air temperatures in July ...
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ERA5 Single Level - Calculate relative humidity
for ERA5 hourly data on single level relative humidity can not be downloaded. However, dewpoint temperature is given and in the description it is stated that "combined with temperature and ...
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Change in vapour pressure due to climate change
I was just wondering how much the vapour pressure has changed due to climate change. Because with changing temperatures, the vapour pressure also changes; this is described by the Clausius-Clapeyron ...
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Why do colder climates have more rugged coasts?
I've been playing Worldle for a while, and noticed that colder countries seem to have more rugged coasts. See Svalbard for example:
And Patagonia:
Whereas e.g. Bali is smoother:
Does it have ...
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If radiative forcing will remain the same when 'net-zero' is achieved, why do some experts think the climate will not warm after this?
As argued in this Nature letter [1] by Matthews and Weaver, when we achieve net-zero emissions further warming will cease. The authors cite numerous models, and say that future emissions are a leading ...
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What would the climate and greenhouse effects be if the oceans contained half as much water?
Imagine the Earth contains 50% the water it currently contains. The oceans are still located in the same place, but they are much shallower. How would this affect the climate and the climate stability ...
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How quickly climate zones are shifting due to climate change!
Hi I was wondering how fast the climate zones (according to W. Köppen) have shifted in the last 22 years. It is well known that the zones shift about 100-200 km to the north or south for each degree ...
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How does the increase in CO2 concentration model explain the extreme lower colder temperatures
With burning of fossil fuels resulting in increased CO2 concentration, I get how increase in CO2 leads to a hotter planet and global warming because Earth's heat balance has been affected by CO2 ...
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How does water vapor cool the troposphere?
I have read about the Fixed Anvil Temperature (FAT) hypothesis and wonder why radiative cooling decreases with decreasing water vapor mixing ratio.
Doesn't this stand in contrast with the fact, that ...
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Isotope fractionations
The isotopic fractionations in the precipitate are equilibrium fractionations and the evolution of a system can be described using Rayleigh destillation! The fractionation type during evaporation is ...
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In the northern hemisphere summer, why are places in the north cooler than those in the south?
As the Earth's axis is inclined, during summer in the northern hemisphere places in the north are exposed to the Sun's rays for longer, so days are longer during summer (say in June - Aug). Yet, ...
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Where can I live if I like long periods of consistent rain?
Let me elaborate on what I mean by "long periods of consistent rain".
I currently live in London and contrary to popular belief, it's not rainy. When it rains, it's usually only for 20 ...
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If Earth's axis wasn't slanted, would all earth be tropical? [duplicate]
If Earth's axis wasn't slanted, would all Earth be tropical due to even scattering of sun light beams all over the planet?
Of course, the poles would still be cold, even colder, but earth in general ...
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Is the current tropical depression headed towards Taiwan unusually early for the season? (April 7, 2022 at 4.0N 148.0E)
Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau's Current Western North Pacific Tropical Cyclones page shows a tropical depression with the following information:
TROPICAL DEPRESSION
TD02
Position 061800Z at 4.0N ...
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Does absorbed energy from sun go to increasing atmosphere's height, as well as heating earth up?
Water transports heat from the surface of the earth to the upper atmosphere by evaporation, which cools the surface, and then condensing at cloud height, where it releases latent heat. So water ...
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How far Kinshasa DRC is tilted away from the solar plane on the summer and winter solstices?
I am given examples of this for Brampton (Canada) (43° 41’ latitude)
On the Summer Solstice you do latitude minus the Earth’s axis tilt which is 23° 26’, so 43° 41’ - 23° 26’ = 20° 15’.
On the Winter ...
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radar data for buoyancy measurements of cyclones
I'm sorry if I'm asking in the wrong forum. I'm a computational scientist and I do not have much physics background.
I'm working on constructing machine learning models from data. Currently, I've only ...
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What is the unit impact of $\small\sf{CO_2}$ on global temperature?
I'm trying to find the impact of X tonnes of CO2 on global temperature so I can infer the unit impact of CO2 on temperature. While we know there is a positive correlation, I can't seem to find a study ...
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How do higher-latitude convection cell currents (Ferrel, Polar) work?
I'm a forest ecologist and college professor who has been teaching about the Earth's convection cell circulation for many years. Explaining Hadley cells is very straightforward with differences in ...
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Is there any place on Earth that does not have a "sub-annual" cycle/season?
I am not sure if this question makes sense, it is completely out of the blue. Over a large range of latitudes, we have 4 distinct seasons and repeat again and again the next years. Even in the poles, ...
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Extract data from NetCDF file with tripolar projection for lat & long coordinates
I have coordinates obtained from Google Maps (latitude and longitude). I also downloaded a number of NetCDF4 files for different years and months that contain sea surface temperature (SST) from the ...
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How to convert CORDEX netcdf data to be used for importing data to DHI Mike?
I have the CORDEX netcdf data and I would like to convert them to raw text file that can be used for importing data to DHI Mike.
To give more context, I have previously converted the ECMWF netcdf (...
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Why don't errors accumulate in climate models when the time horizon increases?
First of all, I want to add the disclaimer that I am not a climate sceptic or anything. I honestly want to understand this phenomenon. Hopefully, someone can also go into the details as I do have ...
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In terms of atmospheric pressure, why do pressure systems move and what factors affect the general pressure of an area?
With very limited background in the physics of air and weather, this question occurred to me for no particular reason. With that in mind, a simplified answer would be much appreciated.
This weatherman'...
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How to calculate Ocean heat content?
I have subsurface temperature data for up to 300 m oceanic depth (at varying depth intervals). I want to calculate the ocean heat content for 0-300 m.
The formula is:
OHC = seawater density * Specific ...
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Why is iron an essential part of iron fertilization and carbon sink?
I just started researching iron fertilization, which is the induction of carbon sinks in the atmosphere through depositing iron in large areas, specifically the ocean. Why do most of the studies ...
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What was the weather like in Pangaea's equatorial regions ( i.e. 23 latitude North to 23 latitude South )?
I've been having this burning question about the tropical climate of Pangaea but not sure how to ask until now.
So far I've read that the carbon dioxide levels back then were much higher than it is ...
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