how does the angle at which the sun's rays strike the earth affect the temperature at the earth's surface?

Answer 1

Well, if you have ever bowled, you may notice that, if your ball hits a pin dead on, the pin goes backward at full force. However, if the ball just touches the pin, the pin falls over slowly.

Your question is essentially the same principle. The force is strongest when the sun rays are straight on. If the rays are at an angle, the force drops off by the sine of the angle.

Answer 2

Forget what those other guys told you. This is how it is, in a nut shell. When the sun is over head, the sun's rays are going through less atmosphere than it would be if it were late afternoon , therefore , it gets warmer. The more atmosphere that the sun has to go through, the more particles that the sun's rays has to bounce off, therefore, it's not as warm. Particle in the Earths atmosphere reflect sunlight, therefore the more atmosphere, the less warmth that reaches the Earth. And if the ozone were depleated, things will really get hot. Less particles.

Answer 3

When the sun's rays strike the Earth at a shallow angle, the energy is spread out over a larger area. As such, areas that recieve less direct sunlight heat up less during the day which is why areas further from the equator tend to be cooler.

Answer 4

The biosphere is as substantial as existence itself because of fact it extremely is all of existence. without the biosphere, the Earth may well be a ineffective planet collectively with Mars or Venus. existence began some 3.5 billion years in the past interior the oceans of an Earth very distinctive from what we see at present. Early varieties of existence have been quite straightforward single celled organisms, extremely like contemporary bacteria, that someway gained the flexibility to reproduce themselves spontaneously. by eons of geologic time, different greater complicated organisms developed and at last the selection of existence grow to be waiting to inhabit the dry lands and skies besides because of fact the oceans. a lot of those organisms, such because of fact the dinosaur, no longer exist. Others that all of us comprehend of at present, consisting of ourselves, have in basic terms been around for some million years or much less. existence is fragile. because of fact the biosphere is made up of all existence, it too is fragile. human beings could have a extensive result on the biosphere, in the two solid and undesirable strategies. the enhance of the human inhabitants in the international potential there is far less room for different species. because of this, many varieties of flowers and animals have been partly or thoroughly wiped out. The biosphere is substantial to human beings because of fact we are able to have any such profound result on it. as nicely, the biosphere sustains us, the two interior the food that we consume, and interior the air that we breathe. no rely if we are vegetarians or meat-eaters, the potential we want and the protein we ought to construct our bodies comes from issues interior the biosphere. We additionally want oxygen to respire, and the organisms on the sea and on earth use our waste carbon dioxide, starting to be the oxygen we ought to respire.

Answer 5

It all has to do width energy per meter. Lets say during 12:00 on an equinox you get 1000 WATS of energy per meter^2. Then on the summer solstice you may get 2000 WATS per m^2, and in winter maby only 500. It all depends on angle.

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