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More on Global Dimming

Posted by michael on from the future's-so-dark-I-don't-need-to-wear-shades dept.

dtolman writes "According to the New York Times (registration required) if the world seemed brighter to our grandparents 50 years ago, they were right. While the sun's output hasn't dropped, the amount of sunshine reaching the Earth's surface has dropped an average of 10% since the 1950's. In Hong Kong, the sunlight reaching the surface has decreased even more - 37%! Scientists are theorizing that this is mainly due to air pollution - so this trend might reverse if air pollution clears up." We had a another story on global dimming last year.

3 of 379 comments (clear)

  1. I can attest to this. by Power+Everywhere · · Score: 4, Interesting

    In the area i live alone, my father has remarked several times in the last five years how either his eyes have gotten used to the sun after almost sixty years, or that things are a lot dimmer -- he used to wear Blueblockers religiously but now doesn't even keep a pair around.

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  2. Some else of interest by spuke4000 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    An unrelated, but similar phonomenon is that of the effect of jet contrails on temperature. You can read about it here. The study used the period after 9/11 when all flights in North America were grounded for a few days. An interesting read.

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  3. We Need Global Dimming by SoopahMan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    That previous story on Slashdot included Dimming's relation to Warming - in particular, scientists suspect Mars lost its water in a disastrous event called a "Hot Spot," where one point in the ocean reaches so high a temperature that it begins evaporating so fast it actually magnifies the sun's heating effect at that surface point - causing nearly all the ocean to leave the planet through that spot.

    Dimming was suggested as the reason this has not occurred - that although heat is up, average sun exposure to the surface is down, and so, evaporation is down too. The net effect is a constant level of evaporation despite rising temps.

    So - is Dimming the buffer that keeps the Earth alive during times of Global Warming? Or is it possible to lose Dimming and keep Warming, rendering us as waterless as Mars? Or, is the Hot Spot theory just hot air in the first place?