The Earth currently retains twice as much heat as it did 14 years ago, raising concerns about accelerating climate change, according to a new study.
In this study, scientists looked at data from the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES), NASA’s earth observation satellite, and measured the amount of energy the Earth absorbs from light from the Earth. sun and energy is sent back into space in the form of infrared radiation.
The imbalance between the energy absorbed and the energy re-emitted is called energy imbalance. And research shows that between 2005 and 2019, the energy imbalance doubled compared to previous years.
Scientists used additional data from Argo, an international network of robotic sensors spread across the world’s oceans, which measures the rate at which those oceans are warming. Comparing the CERES data with that of Argo, the researchers say, strengthens the study’s conclusions as the world’s oceans are known to absorb up to 90% of the excess energy (from imbalances) than Earth does. retains.
Norman Loeb, lead author of the new study and CERES principal investigator at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., Said in a statement: “These are two independent approaches to examining these findings. Changes in energy imbalance Earth and both show this very big trend. And we find this trend quite alarming. “
Loeb and his colleagues conclude that the increase in heat is the result of both natural and man-made processes. The increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane in Earth’s atmosphere have resulted in our planet being trapped in more heat.
Meanwhile, as global temperatures rise, the size of the ice caps shrinks, reducing the transmitted energy reflected from the Earth’s surface.
In addition, the researchers found that a repeating pattern in nature known as the Pacific Decline Oscillation (PDO) also contributes to this process. As a result, the PDO cycle causes frequent fluctuations in the temperature of the Pacific Ocean, with the western part getting colder and the eastern part warming for 10 years, reversing the trend a decade later. An unusually intense period of PDO that began around 2014 reduced cloud formation over the oceans, which also allowed Earth to increase its ability to absorb incoming energy, scientists say. .
