A recent study indicates that the earth has darkened, or to put it in a better way, it is reflecting less sunlight back into space, something that could have a strong impact on climate.
The earth reflects less sunlight than it did 20 years ago. Source: pixnio.com.
According to a study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, due to climate change the Earth reflects about half a watt per square meter less light than it did 20 years ago.
A group of researchers from the Big Bear Solar Observatory has been tracking the Earth's reflectance, which is a climate parameter based on observing the Earth's brightness using photometric techniques to accurately detect changes in the Earth's albedo from the Earth's brightness.
Scientists were measuring this parameter between 1998 and 2017, recording the faint glow caused by the earth in the dark areas of the crescent moon, finding a gradual but significant decrease for the climatic effects of global albedo over the two decades of study.
This albedo, or Earth's reflectance, as the fraction of shortwave sunlight reflected back to space is known, is a key parameter in the Earth's climate, as the decrease in sunlight reflected back to space is related to the insulation caused by greenhouse gases.
On average the Earth returns to space 30% of the sunlight it receives, but between the study period it is estimated that this parameter has decreased by about 0.5%, something small but climatologically significant. And the largest decrease occurred during the last three years of the study.
The sunlight reflected by the earth can be affected by two factors, the brightness of the sun or the reflectance of the planet, but during the study it was not possible to correlate the data with periodic changes in sunlight, so the conclusion is that the reflectance of the planet is the cause and is changing because of something on the planet.
Earth's reflectance. Image created in PowerPoint.
It seems that this is a consequence of other effects that have been recorded, such as the reduction of bright, low altitude clouds in the Pacific Ocean, which leave the ocean uncovered, darker and less reflective, and to this is added the progressive polar melting that causes the earth to absorb more heat.
As we can see, there are two significant factors behind this process of decreasing the Earth's reflectance, on the one hand the accumulation of greenhouse gases and the enrichment of the atmosphere with dust particles that prevent more light from leaving the atmosphere, as well as the decrease of white ice and bright clouds that help to reflect the sunlight back.
So we must consider these aspects and increase research concerning the reduction of the Earth's albedo and its effect on climate change.
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