H. I. Abdussamatov
Pulkovo Observatory of the RAS,St.Petersburg, 196140, Russia
The energy of solar radiation absorbed by the Earth, as well as the thermal radiation of the Earth’s surface, which is released to the space through the atmospheric transparency window, depends on variations of the area of the cloud cover. Svensmark et al. suggest that the increase in the area of the cloud cover in the lower atmosphere, presumably caused by an increase in the flux of galactic cosmic rays during the quasi-bicentennial minimum of solar activity, results only in an increase in the fraction of the solar radiation reflected back to the space and weakens the flux of the solar radiation that reached the Earth surface. It is suggested, without any corresponding calculations of the variations of the average annual energy balance of the Earth Е, that the consequences will include only a deficit of the solar energy absorbed by the Earth and a cooling of the climate up to the onset of the Little Ice Age. These suggestions ignore simultaneous impact of the opposite aspects of the increase in the area of the cloud cover on the climate warming. The latter will result from a decrease in the power of thermal radiation of the Earth’s surface released to the space, and also in the power of the solar radiation reflected from the Earth’s surface, due to the increase in their absorption and reflection back to the surface. A substantial strengthening in the greenhouse effect and the narrowing of the atmospheric transparency window will also occur. Here, we estimate the impact of all aspects of possible long-term 2% growth of the cloud cover area in the lower atmosphere by Е. We found that an increase in the cloud cover area in the lower atmosphere will result simultaneously both in the decrease and in the increase in the temperature, which will virtually compensate each other, while the energy balance of the Earth E before and after the increase in the cloud cover area by 2% will stay essentially the same: E1 - E0 ≈ 0.
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