Meteorology Today
Robert Henson
Language: English
Pages: 640
ISBN: 1305113586
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
C. Donald Ahrens and Robert Henson combine expert content in weather, climate, and earth science with the interactive experience you expect from Cengage Learning. Grounded in the scientific method, this reader-friendly and highly visual book shows you how to observe, calculate, and synthesize information as a budding scientist, systematically analyzing meteorological concepts and issues. Specific discussions center on severe weather systems, such as tornadoes, thunderstorms, and hurricanes, as well as everyday elements, such as wind, precipitation, condensation, masses and fronts, and the seasons. Events and issues dominating today's news cycles also receive thorough attention, and include analysis of Superstorm Sandy, the Oklahoma tornadoes, recent findings from the US National Climate Assessment and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and more. Whether you choose a bound book or eBook, METEOROLOGY TODAY, 11th Edition is a dynamic learning experience packed with end-of-chapter summaries, key terms, review questions, exercises and problems, live animations, web links, and more to carry your learning to atmospheric heights!
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watt (W) is a unit of power where one watt equals one joule (J) per second (J/s). One joule equals 0.24 calories. Energy: Warming the Earth and the Atmosphere 35 FO C U S O N A S P E C IAL TO PI C Consider sunlight in the form of radiant energy striking a large lake. (See Fig. 1.) Part of the incoming energy heats the water, causing greater molecular motion and, hence, an increase in the water’s kinetic energy. This greater kinetic energy allows more water molecules to evaporate from the
widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising sea levels. (We will examine the topic of climate change in more detail in Chapter 16.) BR IEF R E V IE W In the last several sections, we have explored examples of some of the ways radiation is absorbed and emitted by various objects. Before reading the next several sections, let’s review a few important facts and principles: ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● All objects with a temperature above absolute zero emit radiation. The higher an object’s
condense onto nuclei, producing liquid droplets. This would keep the actual mixing ratio close to the saturation mixing ratio, and the relative humidity of the mixed parcel would remain close to 100 percent. that corresponds to the parcel’s dew-point temperature. For a dew-point temperature of 15°C, the actual mixing ratio is 10.8 g/kg. Hence, the relative humidity of the air in parcel A is RH ϭ w 10.8 ϭ ϫ 100 percent ws 15.0 RH ϭ 72 percent. Air parcel B in Fig. 2 is considerably colder than
to this point, we have looked at the different forms of condensation that occur on or near the earth’s surface. In particular, we learned that fog is simply many millions of tiny liquid droplets (or ice crystals) that form near the ground. In the following sections, we will see how these same particles, forming well above the ground, are classified and identified as clouds. ● Condensation nuclei act as surfaces on which water vapor condenses. Those nuclei that have an affinity for water vapor are
heights. This is a difficult procedure, requiring much practice. You can use local objects (hills, mountains, tall buildings) of known height as references on which to base your height estimates. To better describe a cloud’s shape and form, a number of descriptive words may be used in conjunction with its name. We mentioned a few in the previous section; for example, a stratus cloud with a ragged appearance is a stratus fractus, and a cumulus cloud with marked vertical growth is a cumulus
