The Department of Physics

Course Description

This course is an introduction to the basics of physical meteorology, climatology and air pollution. Meteorology is presented first followed naturally by climatology and air pollution and the factors affecting air pollution. PHYS 2156 is one of the 5 Environmental Physics theory courses offered by the Physics Department, and is also one of the 6 courses which may be chosen from to form the Environmental Physics minor (15 credits). Through in-class discussions, and problem solving sessions, Students would have an opportunity to improve their ability to reason through challenging situations in the physical Universe using basic principles to develop appropriate solutions. Assessment and evaluation is done in the form of in-course tests and a Final examination.

CONTENT

Weather & Climate, elements of weather – observations, networks & instruments, EM spectrum, solar spectrum, terrestrial radiation and the atmosphere, sun-earth relations. Composition of the atm., principal variables, interactions with the atm., heating of the atm., Earth’s energy balance, natural greenhouse effect, thermal structure of the atmosphere, vertical profile of pressure & air density. Equation of state. Hydrostatic equilibrium, physical processes in the atm., Thermodynamics of the atm. Meteorological form of first law and its applications, isobaric heating and cooling. Adiabatic reference processes, dry & saturated. Potential temperature. Stability of the atm. Thermodynamic effects of water vapour. Clouds, cloud formation and precipitation. Atmospheric dynamics, equation of motion and forces – gravitational, Coriolis, friction, pressure gradient. Atmospheric dynamics, equation of motion and forces – gravitational, Coriolis, friction, pressure gradient continued. Scale analysis. Horizontal motion of the atm., winds – gradient, geostrophic, cyclonic, thermal. Synoptic scale motion. Continuity equation for the atmosphere and applications. General circulation. Surface and boundary layers. Brief tropical meteorology – hurricanes. Global climate and classification. Trinidad and Tobago’s climate. Earth’s changing climate, radiative forcings. Overview of GCMs, applications, uncertainties and outputs. Air pollution and factors affecting. Ozone depletion process and effects on climate.

GOALS/AIMS

This course explores the behaviour of the lower atmosphere and the physical mechanisms involved, so that the student gets a comprehensive foundation in basic meteorology, the Earth’s climate system and air pollution.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of this course, the students will be able to:

• Explain the composition, physical characteristics and processes relating to the earth’s atmosphere
• Monitor weather parameters
• Apply the meteorological form of the first law of thermodynamics to the thermodynamics processes in the atmosphere
• Assess and determine the state of the atmosphere using different lapse rates
• Determine expressions and values for different types of winds using the 3 component equations of motion as applied to the atmosphere at different levels (free or planetary boundary layer)
• Evaluate the effects of the changes of different components of the earth’s climate system on the warming or cooling of the earth’s atmosphere
• Determine the effects of the varying atmospheric conditions on the degree of air pollution
• Explain the General Circulation Models, their applications and uncertainties
• Analyze meteorological data
• Simulate the greenhouse effect using a simple model
• Determine the effects of certain factors on the earth’s greenhouse effect using a simple model

Assessment