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Scientists understood physics of climate change in the 1800s – thanks to a woman named Eunice Foote

theconversation.com Scientists understood physics of climate change in the 1800s – thanks to a woman named Eunice Foote

The results of Foote’s simple experiments were confirmed through hundreds of tests by scientists in the US and Europe. It happened more than a century ago.

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5 comments

  • She deserves more than a footenote in history.

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  • In quotes is a good response from ChatGPT on the matter, she did not discover the greenhouse effect, only the absorption of energy.

    Her experiment on it's own would support a cooling effect (she showed that CO2 absorbs solar radiation, not the greenhouse effect (which is based on the absorption of outgoing infrared radiation):

    If carbon dioxide (CO2) simply absorbed energy, including sunlight, without re-emitting it, it could lead to cooling at the Earth's surface. This is because the absorbed energy would not be radiated back to the surface, resulting in a net loss of energy from the Earth-atmosphere system.

    Greenhouse effect described:

    However, in the context of the greenhouse effect, CO2 (and other greenhouse gases) not only absorb incoming solar radiation but also absorb and re-emit infrared (IR) radiation emitted by the Earth's surface. This process traps some of the outgoing IR radiation, preventing it from escaping into space and thereby warming the Earth's surface and lower atmosphere. This trapping of IR radiation is what contributes to the warming effect known as the greenhouse effect.

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    • If carbon dioxide (CO2) simply absorbed energy, including sunlight, without re-emitting it, it could lead to cooling at the Earth’s surface. This is because the absorbed energy would not be radiated back to the surface, resulting in a net loss of energy from the Earth-atmosphere system.

      Hmm, I don't follow the argument. If the CO2 and other atmospheric molecules were unable to re-emit the light, they would need to dissipate the excess energy via non-radiative processes. So the main transfer of energy to the surroundings would be via collisions with other molecules. The density of molecules is greater as you approach the surface, and the density in space is very very low. So there are many more molecules to collide with that move the energy in the direction of the surface, and there is no easy pathway to get the heat out of the earth, other than hot molecules diffusing into space.

      So, unless there is an important hole in my reasoning, removing the radiative pathway would ultimately result in a hotter earth because a larger percentage of the energy of light is trapped.

      I think that the main problem in your comment is that it does not account for what happens to the energy that is absorbed. This energy does not disappear - you need to account for it.

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