If you transfer the heat to the atmosphere, it won’t leave the Earth+atmosphere system, so the net effect will be zero. To actually cool the earth, you’d need to heat the atmosphere enough to make parts of it escape Earth’s gravity.
Depends how high you send the heat, I would’ve thought...? If you ferry the heat above the current effective emission-to-space height (the mesosphere should suffice), you warm that high-up air and raise the effective emission-to-space height. Assuming a fixed lapse rate, a cooler surface temperature follows.
I’m a mad scientist, not a real one. I can’t make a complex model that predicts the effects of heating up the mesosphere by a degree in terms of changes in both outgoing heat radiation, reflection and absorption of sunlight, etc. I can only make a very simple model of radiating directly into space from a really, really, really big mad space radiator.
Fair enough, haha. I figured there was a non-trivial chance you were right and I was wrong, because it’s been years since I studied this stuff systematically and my memory of it isn’t great.
Depends how high you send the heat, I would’ve thought...? If you ferry the heat above the current effective emission-to-space height (the mesosphere should suffice), you warm that high-up air and raise the effective emission-to-space height. Assuming a fixed lapse rate, a cooler surface temperature follows.
I’m a mad scientist, not a real one. I can’t make a complex model that predicts the effects of heating up the mesosphere by a degree in terms of changes in both outgoing heat radiation, reflection and absorption of sunlight, etc. I can only make a very simple model of radiating directly into space from a really, really, really big mad space radiator.
So you may well be right; I don’t know.
Fair enough, haha. I figured there was a non-trivial chance you were right and I was wrong, because it’s been years since I studied this stuff systematically and my memory of it isn’t great.