The explanationis quite simply. You only have to take for instance a winter’s night in a frostprone area. During the day if it is a nice clear sunny day the heat from thesun enters the Earth’s atmosphere as short wave radiation. That heats up theearth’s atmosphere. It however, is not the Earth’s atmosphere that heats up theearth that is the direct result of the sun itself. Although the atmosphere canheat up quickly it cannot hold that heat for very long and as a result can’t transferits heat to anything that has a mass density greater than itself.
So the sunheats the Planet during the day. Then at night all that heat energy from thesun then tries to escape back out into the Earth’s atmosphere and beyond – i.e.,outer space. This energy escapes in the form of long wave radiation. Now longwave radiation can be trapped more readily than short wave radiation and thatis why we don’t all freeze to death during the night.
During thiswinter period at night should there be no cloud cover of any significance theEarth’s atmosphere which is predominantly made up of Oxygen, Nitrogen and thattrace gas (0.04%) Co2 that combination can’t to any degree prevent the Earthfrom remaining as warm as it was during the day, even though long waveradiation is more restricted from leaving the Earth’s atmosphere.
Our Planetworks like a glasshouse for plants. During the day the sun’s short waveradiation penetrates the glass of the glasshouse heating up the environment within.Then at night that radiation tries to escape from the glasshouse but most of itcan’t because it is now longwave radiation and that radiation is restricted fromleaving the glasshouse by the glass of the dwelling. Now that is the essence ofthe greenhouse effect and why glasshouses in cooler climates allows for out ofseason vegetable production etc.
It is notthe Co2 that is causing the greenhouse effect but the restrictive nature of theglass of the greenhouse in preventing the earlier sun’s incoming radiation fromescaping.
Coming backto our winter nights in a frost prone area. Clear overnight skies will producea frost in the morning, if there is no wind. However, should the next night becloudy, then in the morning there will be no frost and that is because cloudcover is like the glass of a glasshouse, restricting the long wave radiationfrom leaving the Earth’s atmosphere and thus causing the Earth to remainrelatively warm.
See thedifference!!! It’s not the Co2 trapping the escaping longwave radiation but thecloud cover, just like the glass in the greenhouse.
It is cloudcover that is the real greenhouse gas, i.e., water vapour. And even that only creates a moderating climatic effect!!!!!
