The true greenhouse effect is when the short wave lengths of energy are transmitted by the Sun to the Earth. These pass through the glass of the greenhouse and strike the earth inside the greenhouse. Then this energy is converted to heat. The radiation of heat has a longer wave length and cannot pass through the glass. Thus the heat becomes TRAPPED inside the greenhouse.

Come now the environmentalist's corruption of the greenhouse effect. The Sun gives off the same energy and the rays strike the earth thus converting the light energy to heat. Exactly the same as in the real greenhouse effect. However, this is where the difference is. The Greenhouse Gas Theory says that the CO2 captures or absorbs the heat rays rather than the glass trapping the heat in the real greenhouse effect. One must notice here that the glass of a greenhouse virtually covers 100% of the affected area, whereas CO2 is substantially less than 1% of the atmosphere.

Almost every scientist admits that the 'Greenhouse Effect' has nothing to do with the real greenhouse effect. Thus they admit it is purely a PR stunt designed to stimulate your fear, nothing else. The fact that they make out CO2 as a super collector of heat is scientifically laughable. Back in the 70, many of these same scientists were claiming that CO2 was going to cause an impending Ice Age.

Life magazine of January 30, 1970, stated: “Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support . . . predictions” such as: “In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution,” and “increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will affect earth’s temperature, leading to mass flooding or a new ice age.”

The earth's atmosphere acts the same as a greenhouse. The gases like CO2 kept our planet's surface warm during the day through the sun's heat. Though some of the heat bounces off, the greenhouse gases also trap some of it in the atmosphere. If earth gets warmer and warmer, we may suffer from climate change.

Okay CO2 may cause some warming, but there is no greenhouse effect, greenhouses are warm because they prevent convection, descriptions like trapping heat and acting as a blanket are simply wrong,CO2 does not trap heat it absorbs infrared radiation but re-radiates it instantly, a blanket works by preventing convection.

Our atmosphere keeps us warm, it warms us more than the sun does, because the suns rays only shine on 50% of earths surface at any time and only near the equator with full strength, our atmosphere through convection collects that heat, distributes it throughout the globe and radiates on earths surface 24/7

The greenhouse effect is visible light passing through the transparent windows of the greenhouse and being absorbed by things in the greenhouse (the floor, plants, shelves, everything). This warms those things up, and all warm things cool off by emitting infrared light. They actually glow in infrared. It is like being red hot but cooler. Infrared hot is cooler than red hot. But glass and clear plastic are not clear in infrared light. The infrared light cannot pass through the windows, so it is either reflected back into the greenhouse to be re-absorbed by the objects in there, or it is absorbed by the windows heating them up. This makes the inside of the greenhouse warmer than the outside, even if there is no heater in it.

Air is transparent to visible light just like the greenhouse windows, but it is also transparent to infrared light. But trace gasses in the air are not. Water vapor is not, and Earth's humidity traps heat on Earth just like windows trap heat in a greenhouse. That is why a hot, dry desert is a lot cooler night than a moist tropical area; because more heat escapes to space at night when the air is dry.

Now, there is another trace gas, carbon dioxide, that also blocks infrared light. But unlike humidity it doesn't change much from day to day or place to place. And burning coal, oil, and natural gas gives off carbon dioxide which is not being naturally removed from the air as fast as it is being added by all the fuel burned in our power plants, cars, airplanes, and other machines. This would cause an easily calculated amount of warming if there were no other effects to consider. But there are other effects; mostly due to water. Ice is bright white and reflects visible light back to space right through the water vapor and carbon dioxide, so if there is less ice, then less light gets reflected right back to space and instead is absorbed heating up Earth a bit more. Water vapor also condenses in the air to make bright white clouds, which cools Earth. So the question becomes how much less ice will there be if the carbon dioxide causes a little warming? And how many more clouds will there be if that small warming evaporates more sea water and makes more clouds? So calculating the climate change from only the carbon dioxide level is not easy and we cannot do it as accurately as we need to. That is the cause of all the political battles about global warming.

Step by step and in simple terms…

? The Sun emits heat energy (solar radiation) in all directions.

? Some of that energy travels through space towards Earth

? When the Sun’s energy reaches Earth some of it is reflected into space by the clouds, some is absorbed by the atmosphere and never reaches Earth’s surface.

? Some of the energy is able to pass through our atmosphere without any problems and does reach the surface.

? The heat from the Sun warms the ground, oceans, buildings, trees etc.

? When they cool down the heat from the ground, oceans etc is released into the air.

? This energy is in a different form to when it first arrived from the Sun.

? This new type of energy (thermal or infrared radiation) gets trapped in the atmosphere by greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

? The trapped heat energy is later released by the molecules of greenhouse gases.

? Some of the released energy escapes into space and is lost for good.

? Some of the energy comes back down to Earth.

The greenhouse effect refers to that part of the process where the greenhouse gas molecules trap heat energy and return some of it back down to Earth.