Why the climate is cool in high altitudes despite we are nearer to Sun's heat?

Question

The higher the altitude, the cooler the climate. As we fly above 30 thousand feet, we are nearer to sun by 30 thousand feet. The earth is scotched with Sun's heat. But the same sun is note effective in scotching the flight even though it goes near the Sun. The Rocket should melt, but does not. The mountains which are nearer to sun by a few thousand feet, but they are cool. Why this contoversy ?

Answer 1

Air density. Think of a blanket (non-heated variety) the thicker the blanket, the more warmth it keeps in. The atmosphere acts as a blanket holding in heat (generated by earth and sunlight striking the earth). The more air you have, the better it holds the heat.

Answer 2

Firstly, nearness to the sun has no effect because the earth-to-sun distance is 93 million miles, so an extra 5 miles will make no noticeable difference at all. Besides, that 93 million is only an average, and varies as the earth revolves around the sun.

The key to this question is the TYPE of heat we receive from the sun. It is RADIANT heat, and that warms the ground and the sea. The warm ground then warms the air touching it and the warm air rises, thus warming the lower atmosphere.

At high altitudes the air is less dense (thinner) and the molecules are more thinly spaced, so there are progressively fewer of them to carry heat. At VERY high altitudes the heat retaining potential of the thin air is so low everything stays well below zero.

An aircraft or rocket will in fact be heated a little by the sun, but most of that heat will be reflected as the fuselage is made of shiny metal.

Answer 3

It's because of the "adiabatic lapse rate". The Earth's atmosphere is heated from below, because most of the sunlight is absorbed at the surface. The warm air at the surface rises, transporting heat into the atmosphere. As the air rises, however, it cools as it expands into the lower pressure. This process, convection, continues until the gradients in temperature and pressure reach the adiabatic lapse rate, which is essentially a relation that describes how the temperature must drop as the pressure drops. Then convection slows and stops, leaving a temperature gradient near the adiabatic lapse rate. As others have pointed out, we're 93 million miles from the Sun, so going up mile or two in the atmosphere makes little difference.

Answer 4

Essentially, all of us here on earth are of equal distance to the sun. Ou altitude differ by miles but the distance from the sun is millions of miles. It doesnt make a difference if you are 93 000 000 miles away from the sun and I am 92 999 945 miles away from it.
The temperature difference between altitudes is mainly due to pressure difference and air composition. Those at sea levels are of high pressure and humid while those on mountains are of low pressure and dry.

Answer 5

When the infrared rays from the sun reach the Earth, it's the Earth's surface that absorbs and radiates the heat. Since we are anyway so far from the sun. Moving from 0 m to probably a few kilometers above sea level wouldn't make any difference. But the fact that the accumulated infrared rays heat the surface up would explain why its hotter closer to the surface than somewhere higher.

And there are other factors governing this phenomenon like Sea Breeze and Convection currents. However they are all controlled by the amount of infrared radiation.

By the way, excess of infrared radiation leads to global warming. www.stopglobalwarming.org Check it out. Work towards controlling the rate of heating up of the Earth! :)

Cheers.

Answer 6

Less atmosphere, thus less particles to become excited by the sun. After all, heat is just a function of molecular excitedness.

EDIT:

No Luke, I am completely right.

Adiabatic cooling occurs when the pressure of a substance is decreased, such as when it expands into a larger volume..which the atmosphere does...as I stated above.

So let me spell this out for you.

The reason it becomes colder as altitude increases is because of a decrease in pressure due to the atmosphere being thinner and gas molecules being more spread apart. Because they are more spaced apart, they collide less, and collisions cause heat, therefore less pressure means less heat... which is why it's colder.

Such as what I said above.

Learn the meaning of something before you answer and tell someone they are not right.

Answer 7

Not quite, Cowboy Dan...The atmosphere cools 3.3 degrees for every 1000 ft increase in elevation. Its called adiabatic cooling. The surface is warm because of the reflected solar radiation and reemitted terrestrial radiation from the earth's surface. That's why it snows at high elevations near the Equator (Hawaii, Ecuador, Mt. Kilaminjaro)

Answer 8

The air is thinner so to put it in laymans terms the air can't heat up as much.

Answer 9

Cowboy Dan is correct!