Earth's Radiation Budget: Part 1
This activity received a gold star rating from a Panel Peer Review
HideThis resource received a gold-star rating from a Panel Peer Review
These materials were reviewed using face-to-face NSF-style review panel of geoscience and geoscience education experts to review groups of resources addressing a single theme. Panelists wrote reviews that addressed the criteria:
- scientific accuracy and currency
- usability and
- pedagogical effectiveness
- Accept
- Accept with minor revisions
- Accept with major revisions, or
- Reject.
Following the panel meetings, the conveners wrote summaries of the panel discussion for each resource; these were transmitted to the creator, along with anonymous versions of the reviews. Relatively few resources were accepted as is. In most cases, the majority of the resources were either designated as 1) Reject or 2) Accept with major revisions. Resources were most often rejected for their lack of completeness to be used in a classroom or they contained scientific inaccuracies.
This material is replicated on a number of sites as part of the SERC Pedagogic Service Project
In this activity students explore the Earth's radiation budget using Earth radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) data archived at the IRI/LDEO Climate Data Library (more info) . This archive is complete with visualization tools for easy assessment and visualization of large data sets. Students also use photometers and light sources to work through several hands-on activities related to basic radiation concepts.
Learning Goals
- Introduce students to the Earths Radiation Budget (more info) ;
- Introduce students to the IRI/LDEO Climate Data Library (more info) and associated visualization tools ;
- Provide students with a hands-on laboratory measurement experience;
- Topics covered include:
- albedo;
- clear sky solar, terrestrial, and net radiation;
- angle of incidence and absorbed solar radiation.
Context for Use
This activity can be used as a homework assignment or lab activity in an introductory geoscience course with climate change content. Instructors can also use the ERBE data and graphs or Excel spread sheets for interactive lecture or other data visualization activities.Teaching Materials
All material available at The Earths Radiation Budget Included are:- Background information related to ERBE;
- Lab instructions and questions;
- Data access and visualization links;
- Excel file for modification;
- Link to how to write-up lab reports of this type;
Teaching Notes and Tips
The activity requires 3 to 4 hours to complete and assumes that students have some prior experience using Excel. Earths radiation Budget: Part2 extends this activity to look at the effect of clouds.Assessment
Online teaching materials contain student activities that can help promote student learning. These activities can also be used to help assess student understanding of key idea and concepts.References and Resources
- The Earths Radiation Budget link provides good documentation for references and additional reading.
Other relevant links include:
- Here comes the sun from Plymouth State Meteorology Program.
- Sun Path
- Inverse Square law from University of Oregon.
- Planck Radiation Law (more info) Physics Applet (Physlet) from Davidson College Physics.
