Green house effect is defined as trapping of the long waves in the earth’s atmosphere due to the effect of some gases. This rapping of the long waves causes the rise in the atmospheric temperature. The gases which causes this effect is called as green house gases.
There are lists of gases which have this property of trapping long waves:
- Water vapor. It is a naturally occurring greenhouse gas and accounts for the largest percentage of the greenhouse effect, between 36% and 90%.
- Carbon dioxide. It comes next to the water vapor in terms of effect as a green house effect.
- Methane.
- Nitrous oxide.
- CFC-12.
- HCFC-22
- Tetrafluoromethane .
- Sulfur hexafluoride.
- Carbon monoxide.
Measurements from Antarctic ice cores show that atmospheric CO2 levels were about 280 parts per million by volume just before industrial emissions began. From the same ice cores it appears that CO2 concentrations stayed between 260 and 280 ppm during the preceding 10,000 years.
Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the concentrations of many of the greenhouse gases have increased significantly so much so that there has been drastic change in the atmospheric temperature and significant global warming.
