Untitled Lesson

These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Earth’s Energy Budget

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Unit Driving Question:

Why might the Arctic be warming twice as fast as the rest of the world?

Lesson Driving Question:

How does Earth maintain the perfect balance of energy?

What You Will Be Doing:

●Identify and describe properties of longwave and shortwave energy.

●Create a model that represents Earth’s energy budget.

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Why might the Arctic be warming twice

as fast as the rest of the world?

Figure from NASA

Unit Driving Question

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Driving Question(s) For This Lesson

How does Earth maintain the
perfect balance of energy?

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Warm-up

What does someone mean when they say they are “on a budget”?

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Part 1 - Earth’s energy budget

●The Earth's energy budget
describes the balance between
the energy that is reaching the
Earth from the Sun and the
energy that is flowing back out
into space from the Earth.

●In the simplest sense, if this
energy budget stays balanced,
Earth's temperature stays
constant.

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Energy from the Sun

●Most of the energy on Earth comes from
the Sun.

●Energy is released from the Sun as
photons. Think of photons as tiny packets
of energy.

●Energy travels in waves. Some waves are
short. Some waves are long.

●Properties of energy are determined by
the energies wavelength.

○We can see things around us
because of energy called visible
light.

○We can feel the heat from a
campfire, which is infrared energy
(heat).

Image: NASA

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

The Sun emits shortwave energy

●The Sun emits shortwave energy
(ultraviolet energy and visible
light energy)

●Some of the Sun’s incoming
shortwave energy is reflected off
of Earth.

●Some of the Sun’s incoming
shortwave energy passes
through Earth’s atmosphere and
reaches the Earth’s surface.

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

The Earth emits longwave energy (heat)

●The shortwave energy that
passes through Earth’s
atmosphere is either reflected or
absorbed by the Earth’s surface.

●Shortwave energy absorbed by
Earth’s surface causes the
surface to heat up!

●The Earth releases (emits) this
heat back into the atmosphere
as longwave energy.

○Longwave energy = heat

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Part 2 - Construct a model of Earth’s energy budget

Cut out and arrange pieces onto a larger
sheet of paper to construct a model of
Earth’s energy budget.

●Your model should be annotated
(include text to describe the
connections between the cut out
pieces).

●You may use your notes!

●Be ready to share your models with
the class.

You have 20 minutes

Sun

Clouds

Shortwave energy (sunlight)

Longwave energy (heat)

Earth

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Earth’s energy budget is imbalanced!

The rise in global temperatures
suggests that Earth’s energy
budget is out of balance. Why?

Image from NASA

●Is there more shortwave energy
(sunlight) reaching Earth’s surface?

●Is the Earth remitting (releasing) more
longwave energy (heat)?

●What happens to the longwave energy
(heat) after it has been released into
the atmosphere?

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Part 3: Summary Table

In groups, answer the questions
below in no more than 3 sentences:

1.

What did we learn about Earth’s
energy budget?

2.

How does what you learned
relate to the unit driving question,
“Why might the Arctic be
warming four times as fast as the
rest of the world?”

Lesson
name

What did we learn?

How does it relate to
the unit driving
question?

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

End of Lesson

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These materials were developed by CIRES CEEE at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Key:

Optional: Update Earth’s
energy budget model

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