Interaction of Solar Radiation

with Earth’s Atmosphere

 What is Solar Radiation ?
 Solar radiation is the radiation/ energy we get from the sun. It
is also known as short-wave radiation.
 Solar radiation comes in many forms, such as visible light, radio
waves, heat (infrared), x-rays, and ultraviolet rays.

 Measurements for solar radiation are higher on clear, sunny day and
usually low on cloudy days.
 When the sun is down, or there are heavy clouds blocking the sun,
solar radiation is measured at zero.
 Earth's Atmosphere
 What's an atmosphere?
 Air surrounding a planet
 Earth's atmosphere has 5 layers
 Different planets have different
layers and different gases in their
atmospheres.

 What does it do?

 Protects from Sun's heat (and
space's cold)
day/night temps would be
extreme without blanket of gases
Protects from Sun's harmful rays
solar (ultraviolet) radiation would
destroy all life if not filtered out
 The gases in Earth's atmosphere

Nitrogen – 78 percent

Oxygen – 21 percent

Argon – 0.93 percent

Carbon dioxide – 0.038 percent

Water vapor and other gases exist in small amounts as well

Components of Solar Radiation
The solar radiation that passes through
directly to the earth’s surface is called
direct solar radiation.

The radiation that has been scattered

out of the direct beam is called diffuse
solar radiation.

Direct radiation is measuring by

Pyrheliometer.

Diffuse radiation is measuring by

Phyrnometer
Interactions with the Atmosphere
 Before solar radiation reaches the Earth's surface it has to travel
through some distance of the Earth's atmosphere.

 Particles and gases in the atmosphere can affect the incoming light
and radiation

These effects are caused by the mechanisms of scattering and

absorption.
Solar radiation in the atmosphere
 Scattering
 Scattering occurs when particles or large gas molecules present in
the atmosphere interact with and cause the electromagnetic
radiation to be redirected from its original path.

 How much scattering takes place depends on several factors

including the wavelength of the radiation, the abundance of
particles or gases, and the distance the radiation travels through
the atmosphere.

 There are three (3) types of scattering which take place

 Rayleigh scattering
 Mie scattering
 Nonselective scattering
 Rayleigh scattering
 Rayleigh scattering occurs when particles are very small compared
to the wavelength of the radiation. These could be particles such as
small specks of dust or nitrogen and oxygen molecules.

 It causes shorter wavelengths of energy

to be scattered much more than longer
wavelengths.

It is the dominant scattering mechanism

in the upper atmosphere.
Why the sky is blue and at sunrise/sunset it is
red-orange?
 Mie scattering
Mie scattering occurs when the particles are just about the same
size as the wavelength of the radiation.

 Dust, pollen, smoke and water vapor are common causes of Mie
scattering which tends to affect longer wavelengths than those
affected by Rayleigh scattering.

 Mie scattering occurs mostly in the lower portions of the

atmosphere where larger particles are more abundant, and
dominates when cloud conditions are overcast
 Non-selective scattering

 This occurs when the particles are much larger than the wavelength
of the radiation.

Water droplets and large dust particles can cause this type of
scattering.

It gets its name from the fact that all wavelengths are scattered
about equally.

 This type of scattering causes fog and clouds to appear white to our
eyes because blue, green, and red light are all scattered in
approximately equal quantities (blue+green+red light = white light).
 Absorption
 Absorption is the other main mechanism at work when
electromagnetic radiation interacts with the atmosphere.

 In contrast to scattering, this phenomenon causes molecules in the

atmosphere to absorb energy at various wavelengths.

 Ozone, carbon dioxide, and water vapor are the three main
atmospheric constituents which absorb radiation.