WEEK 1

Overview

What you will find in this class.

1 video, 4 readings

WEEK 2

Heat, Light, and Energy

A primer on how to use units to describe numbers when describing temperature, energy, and light. Even if you don't plan on doing calculations yourself, understanding how units work will help to follow the rest of the lectures in the class. If you are interes...

6 videos, 2 practice quizzes

Graded: What is heat and how can you warm up something in space?

WEEK 3

First Climate Model

The balance of energy flow, as incoming sunlight and outgoing infrared, allow us to create our first simple climate model, including a simple greenhouse effect. There are two extended exercises in Part II of this class, one an analytical (algebraic) model of ...

2 videos, 3 practice quizzes

Graded: Quiz 1

WEEK 4

Greenhouse Gases and the Atmosphere

The Layer Model above assumes that the pane of glass representing the atmosphere absorbs all of the infrared radiation that hits it and that it radiates at all infrared wavelengths. In other words, the layer model atmosphere is an infrared blackbody, but trans...

2 videos

Graded: Model Greenhouse Gases in the Atmosphere

WEEK 5

The Structure of the Atmosphere

The greenhouse effect works because the air in the upper atmosphere is colder than the ground, so that absorption and re-emission of IR by greenhouse gases decreases the amount of energy leaving the planet to space. Here we explore the physics responsible for...

4 videos

Graded: Model the Lapse Rate and Greenhouse Effect

WEEK 6

Weather and Climate

Another property of the real world, missing in our model so far, is that the real world is not everywhere the same temperature, and the heat fluxes to and from space do not necessarily balance at any given time or location. This is because the winds in the atm...

4 videos

Graded: Quiz 2

WEEK 7

Feedbacks

Feedbacks are loops of cause-and-effect that can either stabilize Earth's climate or amplify future climate changes. There is an exercise in Part II of this class where you solve for a planet's temperature by iteration, and in the process demonstrate a runawa...

6 videos

Graded: Model Sunlight, Albedo, and Climate

Graded: Extract the Water Vapor Feedback from Climate Model Results

Graded: Model Clouds 1: IR

Graded: Model Clouds 2: Full-spectrum

Graded: Model Aerosols and Climate

Graded: Calculate the Climate Sensitivity

Graded: Quiz 3

Graded: What are positive and negative feedbacks?

WEEK 8

The Carbon Cycle

Now we shift gears in a major way — away from climate physics (you now have seen its main ingredients) to the emergent miracle that is the carbon cycle on Earth. Not only is carbon the chemical element of life, it is also the means of storing life's energy. We...

9 videos

Graded: Model the Global Carbon Cycle

Graded: Model Ocean/Land CO₂ Uptake with ISAM

Graded: Model Intended vs. Greenhouse Yields

Graded: Quiz 4

WEEK 9

The Perturbed Carbon Cycle

On the carbon locked up in fossil fuels and what happens when we burn those fuels. In Part II of this class, you can create a simple but somewhat realistic model of Earth's temperature evolution in the coming decades, in response to the release of CO2 (or in ...

7 videos

Graded: Model Hubbert's Peak

Graded: Model Kaya Identity

Graded: Fossilizing a Carbon Atom

Graded: Model Methane and Slugulator

Graded: Model the Long Tail

Graded: Quiz 5

Graded: Burning a Carbon Atom

WEEK 10

Looking for a Human Impact on Climate

You have now seen the ideas behind the forecast for a human impact on Earth's climate. The next question is: Do we see it happening today? It turns out that the "smoking gun" for a human impact on climate is the global average temperature record since about th...

10 videos

Graded: Make Maps of Climate Models Warming

Graded: Look for the Smoking Gun

Graded: Browse the Global Glacier Length Data

Graded: Model Borehole Temperatures

Graded: Analyze Recent Solar Intensity Changes

Graded: Quiz 6

Graded: Is it Warming? Is It Us? How Do We Know?

WEEK 11

Potential Impacts

This unit we focus on the potential impacts of continued business-as-usual CO2 emissions. This is also the topic of the Working Group 2 volume of the IPCC reports (the Working Group 1 report is on the scientific basis, which is what we've been studying so far ...

12 videos

Graded: Water Stress in Climate Model Results

Graded: Model Permafrost

Graded: Model Changes in Sea Level

Graded: Play with an Ice Sheet Model, ISM

Graded: Short vs Long Term Sea Level Change

Graded: Find the Increase in Low-Level Humidity in Models

Graded: Extract AR5 Model Lapse Rates

Graded: Model Hurricanes

Graded: Quiz 7

Graded: Global Weirding

WEEK 12

Mitigation

The last unit of the class finds us considering the options for avoiding, or "mitigating," a human impact on Earth's climate. Bottom line: I think it would be a challenge that humankind could beat if we decided to. If there hypothetically were no more coal on ...

8 videos

Graded: Model Stabilization Scenarios

Graded: Model Temperature Targets

Graded: How well does Slugulator do at Slug Theory?

Graded: Model CO2 Sequestration

Graded: Model SRM Geoengineering

Graded: How Many Wedges?

Graded: How Much Carbon-Free Energy by 2100?

Graded: Quiz 8

Graded: Is there Hope for the 11-year-old?

Graded: Term Project: Explore Climate Data and Models