Sep 08 2007
Does the Moon Cool Radiatively?
There has been several searches recently about the moon and radiation leading to my blog. Since I don’t have a post about it yet, hopefully in the future they’ll be directed here by the mighty Google.
Q: Does the moon cool radiatively?
A: Yes. Everything cools radiatively. There are only two other ways to exchange heat (energy): convection and conduction.
Q: What is convection?
A: Convection is the movement of a fluid. The fluid will then carry the heat associated with it (related to its temperature and humidity). In the troposphere of the Earth, heat is transported upwards by convection.
Q: What is conduction?
A: Conduction is heat exchange when two objects are in contact with each other and heat flows from the object with more energy (heat) to the object with less energy.
Q: Why doesn’t the moon cool by conduction or convection?
A: “Outside” the moon is space. For all intents and purposes, it’s nothing. The moon cannot conduct heat to nothing because that heat is stored, for lack of a better term, in the movement and wiggling and giggling of the atoms. Space has no atoms to wiggle and giggle so energy cannot be stored that way. And since energy cannot be created or destroyed, the moon cannot lose heat by conduction. By a similar line of reasoning, the moon cannot cool by convection. Space is not a fluid - it has no atoms, remember? No atoms, no fluid; no fluid, no convection. Thereby, the moon must cool radiatively.
Q: How does the Earth cool?
A: Radiatively. See above.
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...Related Posts:
One Response to “Does the Moon Cool Radiatively?”
To reduce spam, comments are automatically closed 30 days after the last comment. If you would like to comment on any closed thread, please use the contact form at the top of this page.
Well, latent heat is in some sense a way to transport heat ,ain´t it? Not that it matters for cooling the moon or the earth, but it matters for the distribution of heat in the Earths climate system.