Talk:Greenhouse effect

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Section sizes

Section size for Greenhouse effect (42 sections)
Section name	Byte count	Section total
(Top)	9,467	9,467
Definition	1,383	1,383
Terminology	1,583	1,583
History of discovery and investigation	2,582	2,582
Measurement	2,274	2,274
Role in climate change	7,103	7,103
Energy balance and temperature	37	12,469
Incoming shortwave radiation	1,711	1,711
Outgoing longwave radiation	2,882	2,882
Effective temperature	2,033	2,033
Energy flux	903	903
Radiative balance	3,934	3,934
Day and night cycle	969	969
Effect of lapse rate	27	6,710
Lapse rate	1,515	1,515
Emission temperature and altitude	2,346	2,346
Greenhouse gases and the lapse rate	2,822	2,822
Infrared absorbing constituents in the atmosphere	57	7,316
Greenhouse gases	303	6,029
Infrared active gases	1,402	1,402
Absorption and emission	1,469	1,469
Radiative effects	2,855	2,855
Clouds and aerosols	1,230	1,230
Basic formulas	22	9,317
Effective temperature	1,310	1,310
Metrics for the greenhouse effect	3,724	3,724
Radiative balance	2,974	2,974
Greenhouse effect and temperature	1,287	1,287
Misconceptions	4,305	4,305
Simplified models	501	3,857
Atmospheric layer models	1,261	1,261
Equivalent emission altitude	2,095	2,095
Related effects on Earth	31	1,534
Negative greenhouse effect	1,396	1,396
Runaway greenhouse effect	107	107
Bodies other than Earth	2,941	12,716
Venus	4,691	4,691
Mars	1,455	1,455
Titan	1,807	1,807
Effect of pressure	1,822	1,822
See also	314	314
References	3,360	3,360
Total	86,290	86,290

Simplified caption for first image?

I don't see why we need to effectively repeat the text inside the first image as the caption for that image. That's particularly true as the first paragraph of the article is also a synopsis of the greenhouse effect. Here is how things currently appear:

What I would like to do is change the caption to something brief and informative, as shown here:

Thoughts, particularly RCraig09? Efbrazil (talk) 16:32, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Option B is not informative at all; it's essentially a criticism of the chart itself. Option A is noticeably more concise than the lead's text. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:40, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The main point is that it is redundant with the text in the image itself. The image text says this:

Some sunlight that hits Earth is reflected back into space, while the rest becomes heat. Greenhouse gases absorb and redirect heat radiated by Earth, insulating it from heat loss to space.

This caption is really redundant with that:

the greenhouse effect occurs when greenhouse gases first allow sunlight to pass through the atmosphere and heat the planet, but then absorb and redirect some of the outgoing longwave radiation (heat) that the planet emits.

The caption I offered wasn't meant as a critique, just a pointer to other image people might find useful for showing how the greenhouse effect works. I'd also be fine just saying "Simplified diagram of how the greenhouse effect works", or other suggestions that aren't redundant. Thoughts? Efbrazil (talk) 16:48, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Option A is reader-centric but Option B is editor-centric. Although Option A tells the story sequentially and I favor it over Option B which points lay readers to the bowels of Commons, ...we could have NO caption for that particular graphic. That would work for me. —RCraig09 (talk) 19:30, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Cool, no caption works for me! I'll make the edit... Efbrazil (talk) 20:48, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Greenhouse gases trap some of the heat that results when sunlight heats the Earth's surface. Three important greenhouse gases are shown symbolically in this image: carbon dioxide, water vapor, and methane.

Hmmm, I don't know but I think I'd prefer an image caption. I quite liked Option B, actually. The wikilink for "other options" could go somewhere else as well (but I don't mind if it goes to Commons). But I also wonder if that chosen image is really suitable. Compare with the lead image at greenhouse gas (on the right) which I think is a lot better. Wondering if we should maybe use the same image here (even though I usually argue that the lead image should be unique for each Wikipedia article). Just putting out some food for thought. EMsmile (talk) 09:14, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I was also looking for a good symbolic image for the German Wikipedia to visualize the greenhouse effect. I did not find one, so I created a new image. I had the idea that maybe the difference between the presence of and the absence of greenhouse gases could be a good visual way to explain the effect. In the German article I have added a caption with 3 sentences to describe each of the 3 sections. But the image is also self-explanatory and could work without captions. Physikinger (talk) 22:24, 11 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry, but this image is confusing for the casual viewer-- so many arrows! Only one sun? Two planets or three? Also, it hurts my eyes. The current image has a lot of text. Text is for article content, not so much images. I created the image mentioned by EMsmile. I did my best to make it visually interesting, informative, and easily grasped with a minimum of text. I am also biased against renditions of the sun as a golden marble, and against depictions of Earth as having sapphire blue oceans and emerald green continents everywhere. Lastly, the red arrows are "bouncing" off of nothing in that image. Why not show them bouncing off of molecules in the air, the way they actually are? A loose necktie (talk) 13:16, 29 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

First of all, I really like your picture. It's a very nice and inspiring SVG artwork, and I'm using it as well in the German greenhouse effect Wikipedia article. But there are some points why I decided not to use it as the thumbnail image of the article:

The molecules and text are so small that I found it less suitable as a symbolic thumbnail, which appears quite small in Google searches and when hovering over wiki links.
There was also a discussion about a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqu5DjzOBF8 about a common misconception that heat radiation does not bounce between the sky and the ground, but rather most of the time between molecules. It's more a diffusive energy transport.
In many drawings like yours, the atmosphere is shown as a layer like the roof of a greenhouse, which gives a false impression.

With my image I tried to improve these points. I don't really understand your criticism. It's primarily a symbolic image, trying to convey an abstract idea of what the essence of the effect is. With the arrows I am trying to express that the mean free paths are very short in the presence of the greenhouse gases and that the surface cooling becomes less efficient.

But don't get me wrong. I don't want to convince anyone to use my image. I just wanted to give a hint that there is another drawing. Physikinger (talk) 18:02, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Unsourced opinion

The section "Effects of pressure"

I don't really understand the section "Effects of pressure": do we really need it? Or is it in the right position? It's under "bodies other than Earth" but then it does talk about the situation on Earth. I wonder if it's perhaps too detailed for this high-level article? EMsmile (talk) 14:35, 7 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Circle

The greenhouse effect occurs when greenhouse gases in a planet's atmosphere This is a circular explanation. You should never explain a term with itself. Better is 'ir active gases'. 2003:E5:272D:4A00:6511:D243:C8D4:3A09 (talk) 19:12, 13 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This is an encyclopedia, not a dictionary. Here, the term greenhouse gas is wikilinked to its own article. The term "IR active gases" is non-standard. —RCraig09 (talk) 19:45, 13 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

IPCC: The greenhouse effect is the infrared radiative effect of all infrared-absorbing constituents in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gases (GHGs), clouds, and some aerosols absorb terrestrial radiation emitted by the Earth’s surface and elsewhere in the atmosphere. 79.127.158.105 (talk) 09:00, 30 December 2024 UCTT

Eunice Newton Foote

What has she measured? Differences in thermal conductivity? All gases showed significant differences in their physical parameters (density, thermal conductivity). Changed convection? Anything is possible. But not the greenhouse effect. That cannot be measured in a laboratory experiment. 2003:E5:272D:4A00:6511:D243:C8D4:3A09 (talk) 19:24, 13 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

We're talking about radiant heat (Thermal radiation), not physical-contact thermal conductivity or convection. The GHE is measurable in the laboratory. —RCraig09 (talk) 19:43, 13 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There is no laboratory experiment that proves the atmospheric greenhouse effect. The warming in the greenhouse is largely due to suppressed convection. The well-known high school experiments are wrong. If you use the noble gas argon instead of CO2, you get the same results within the limits of measurement accuracy. However, unlike CO2, Argon is not infrared active. If the GHE could be proven in the laboratory, the discussion about it would be over. You will not find any reference to such an experiment in the IPCC reports.

Paul Wagoner; Chunhua Liu; R. G. Tobin

Climate change in a shoebox: Right result, wrong physics

Am. J. Phys. 78, 536–540 (2010) 79.127.158.105 (talk) 08:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

ok good like and share with friends . and dont read the last one it is wierd. 213.172.149.70 (talk) 11:35, 18 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

CO2 has important absorption lines at about 1.5, 5.3 and 15 μm. The 1.5 μm line is very weak (you can change the setting to μm, normal X and absorption). Normal glass is only transparent to the near IR range. From this point of view, Eunice Newton Foote's results cannot be explained by IR absorption. IR-transparent glasses now exist, but they were not yet available in 1856.

Note: You always have to consider all effects of heat transfer! 79.127.158.105 (talk) 09:36, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Pure Tautology!

The greenhouse effect occurs when greenhouse gases in a planet's atmosphere insulate the planet from losing heat to space, raising its surface temperature. That is pure tautology! It is the same as in the IPCC Assessment Reports. Assuming the existence of a 'Greenhouse Gas' does not make it exist! Damorbel (talk) 07:03, 22 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]