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Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus

Received: 10 March 2020     Accepted: 25 March 2020     Published: 23 April 2020
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Abstract

The terrestrial planet Venus is classified by astronomers as an inferior planet because it is located closer to the Sun than the Earth. Venus orbits the Sun at a mean distance of 108.21 Million Km and receives an average annual solar irradiance of 2601.3 W/m2, which is 1.911 times that of the Earth. A set of linked forward and inverse climate modelling studies were undertaken to determine whether a process of atmospheric energy retention and recycling could be established by a mechanism of energy partition between the solid illuminated surface and an overlying fully transparent, non-greenhouse gas atmosphere. Further, that this atmospheric process could then be used to account for the observed discrepancy between the average annual solar insolation flux and the surface tropospheric average annual temperature for Venus. Using a geometric climate model with a globular shape that preserves the key fundamental property of an illuminated globe, namely the presence on its surface of the dual environments of both a lit and an unlit hemisphere; we established that the internal energy flux within our climate model is constrained by a process of energy partition at the surface interface between the illuminated ground and the overlying air. The dual environment model we have designed permits the exploration and verification of the fundamental role that the atmospheric processes of thermal conduction and convection have in establishing and maintaining surface thermal enhancement within the troposphere of this terrestrial planet. We believe that the duality of energy partition ratio between the lit and unlit hemispheres applied to the model, fully accounts for the extreme atmospheric “greenhouse effect” of the planet Venus. We show that it is the meteorological process of air mass movement and energy recycling through the mechanism of convection and atmospheric advection, associated with the latitudinal hemisphere encompassing Hadley Cell that accounts for the planet’s observed enhanced atmospheric surface warming. Using our model, we explore the form, nature and geological timing of the climatic transition that turned Venus from a paleo water world into a high-temperature, high-pressure carbon dioxide world.

Published in International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (Volume 4, Issue 1)
DOI 10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13
Page(s) 20-35
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Atmospheric Dynamics, Venus Atmosphere, Geophysics, Terrestrial Planets

References
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[3] Persson, A. O., 2005. The Coriolis Effect: Four centuries of conflict between common sense and mathematics, Part I: A history to 1885. International Commission on the History of Meteorology 2, 24pp.
[4] Del Genio, A. D. and Suozzo, R. J., 1987. A Comparative Study of Rapidly and Slowly Rotating Dynamical Regimes in a Terrestrial General Circulation Model. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, Vol. 44 (6), pp. 973-984.
[5] Luz, D., Berry, D. L., Piccioni, G., Drossart, P., Politi, R., Wilson, C. F., Erard, S. and Nuccilli, F., 2011. Venus’s southern polar vortex reveals precessing circulation. Science, 332 (6029), pp. 577-580.
[6] Seiff, A., Schofield, J. T., Kliore, A. J., Taylor, F. W., Limaye, S. S., Revercomb, H. E., Sromovsky, L. A., Kerzhanovich, V. V., Moroz, V. I. and Marov, M. Y., 1985. Models of the structure of the atmosphere of Venus from the surface to 100 kilometers altitude. Advances in Space Research, 5 (11), pp. 3-58.
[7] Sicardy, B., Talbot, J., Meza, E., Camargo, J. I. B., Desmars, J., Gault, D., Herald, D., Kerr, S., Pavlov, H., Braga-Ribas, F. and Assafin, M., 2016. Pluto’s atmosphere from the 2015 June 29 ground-based stellar occultation at the time of the New Horizons flyby. The Astrophysical journal letters, 819 (2), p. L38.
[8] Quote Investigator, Tracing Quotations 2011. Albert Einstein? Louis Zukofsky? Roger Sessions? William of Ockham? Anonymous? https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/05/13/einstein-simple/.
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[12] Hunt, B. G., 1979. The Influence of the Earth's Rotation Rate on the General Circulation of the Atmosphere. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, Vol. 36 (8), pp. 1392-1408.
[13] Zasova, L. V., Ignatiev, N., Khatuntsev, I. and Linkin, V., 2007. Structure of the Venus atmosphere. Planetary and Space Science, 55 (12), pp. 1712-1728.
[14] Robinson, T. D. and Catling, D. C., 2014. Common 0.1 bar tropopause in thick atmospheres set by pressure-dependent infrared transparency. Nature Geoscience, 7 (1), pp. 12-15.
[15] Justus, C. G. and Braun, R. D., 2007. Atmospheric Environments for Entry, Descent, and Landing (EDL) NASA Natural Environments Branch (EV13).
[16] Holmes, R. I., 2019. On the Apparent Relationship Between Total Solar Irradiance and the Atmospheric Temperature at 1 Bar on Three Terrestrial-type Bodies. Earth, 8 (6), pp. 346-351.
[17] DKL Engineering Inc. 2005-2018. Sulphuric Acid on the Web: Freezing Points of Sulphuric Acid.
[18] Holmes, R. I., 2018. Thermal Enhancement on Planetary Bodies and the Relevance of the Molar Mass Version of the Ideal Gas Law to the Null Hypothesis of Climate Change. Earth, 7 (3), pp. 107-123.
[19] ESA, 2013. The fast winds of Venus are getting faster. Astronomy News, Wednesday, June 19, 2013.
[20] Mitchell, D. P., 2003. Plumbing the atmosphere of Venus. The Soviet Exploration of Venus.
[21] Zasova, L. V., Moroz, V. I., Linkin, V. M., Khatuntsev, I. V. and Maiorov, B. S., 2006. Structure of the Venusian atmosphere from surface up to 100 km. Cosmic Research, 44 (4), pp. 364-383.
[22] Meadows, V. S. and Crisp, D., 1996. Ground-based near-infrared observations of the Venus nightside: The thermal structure and water abundance near the surface. Journal of Geophysical Research, Volume 101, Issue E2, pp. 4595-4622.
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Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    Philip Mulholland, Stephen Paul Rathbone Wilde. (2020). Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus. International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, 4(1), 20-35. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13

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    ACS Style

    Philip Mulholland; Stephen Paul Rathbone Wilde. Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus. Int. J. Atmos. Oceanic Sci. 2020, 4(1), 20-35. doi: 10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13

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    AMA Style

    Philip Mulholland, Stephen Paul Rathbone Wilde. Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus. Int J Atmos Oceanic Sci. 2020;4(1):20-35. doi: 10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13,
      author = {Philip Mulholland and Stephen Paul Rathbone Wilde},
      title = {Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus},
      journal = {International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences},
      volume = {4},
      number = {1},
      pages = {20-35},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijaos.20200401.13},
      abstract = {The terrestrial planet Venus is classified by astronomers as an inferior planet because it is located closer to the Sun than the Earth. Venus orbits the Sun at a mean distance of 108.21 Million Km and receives an average annual solar irradiance of 2601.3 W/m2, which is 1.911 times that of the Earth. A set of linked forward and inverse climate modelling studies were undertaken to determine whether a process of atmospheric energy retention and recycling could be established by a mechanism of energy partition between the solid illuminated surface and an overlying fully transparent, non-greenhouse gas atmosphere. Further, that this atmospheric process could then be used to account for the observed discrepancy between the average annual solar insolation flux and the surface tropospheric average annual temperature for Venus. Using a geometric climate model with a globular shape that preserves the key fundamental property of an illuminated globe, namely the presence on its surface of the dual environments of both a lit and an unlit hemisphere; we established that the internal energy flux within our climate model is constrained by a process of energy partition at the surface interface between the illuminated ground and the overlying air. The dual environment model we have designed permits the exploration and verification of the fundamental role that the atmospheric processes of thermal conduction and convection have in establishing and maintaining surface thermal enhancement within the troposphere of this terrestrial planet. We believe that the duality of energy partition ratio between the lit and unlit hemispheres applied to the model, fully accounts for the extreme atmospheric “greenhouse effect” of the planet Venus. We show that it is the meteorological process of air mass movement and energy recycling through the mechanism of convection and atmospheric advection, associated with the latitudinal hemisphere encompassing Hadley Cell that accounts for the planet’s observed enhanced atmospheric surface warming. Using our model, we explore the form, nature and geological timing of the climatic transition that turned Venus from a paleo water world into a high-temperature, high-pressure carbon dioxide world.},
     year = {2020}
    }
    

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  • TY  - JOUR
    T1  - Inverse Climate Modelling Study of the Planet Venus
    AU  - Philip Mulholland
    AU  - Stephen Paul Rathbone Wilde
    Y1  - 2020/04/23
    PY  - 2020
    N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13
    DO  - 10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13
    T2  - International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences
    JF  - International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences
    JO  - International Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences
    SP  - 20
    EP  - 35
    PB  - Science Publishing Group
    SN  - 2640-1150
    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijaos.20200401.13
    AB  - The terrestrial planet Venus is classified by astronomers as an inferior planet because it is located closer to the Sun than the Earth. Venus orbits the Sun at a mean distance of 108.21 Million Km and receives an average annual solar irradiance of 2601.3 W/m2, which is 1.911 times that of the Earth. A set of linked forward and inverse climate modelling studies were undertaken to determine whether a process of atmospheric energy retention and recycling could be established by a mechanism of energy partition between the solid illuminated surface and an overlying fully transparent, non-greenhouse gas atmosphere. Further, that this atmospheric process could then be used to account for the observed discrepancy between the average annual solar insolation flux and the surface tropospheric average annual temperature for Venus. Using a geometric climate model with a globular shape that preserves the key fundamental property of an illuminated globe, namely the presence on its surface of the dual environments of both a lit and an unlit hemisphere; we established that the internal energy flux within our climate model is constrained by a process of energy partition at the surface interface between the illuminated ground and the overlying air. The dual environment model we have designed permits the exploration and verification of the fundamental role that the atmospheric processes of thermal conduction and convection have in establishing and maintaining surface thermal enhancement within the troposphere of this terrestrial planet. We believe that the duality of energy partition ratio between the lit and unlit hemispheres applied to the model, fully accounts for the extreme atmospheric “greenhouse effect” of the planet Venus. We show that it is the meteorological process of air mass movement and energy recycling through the mechanism of convection and atmospheric advection, associated with the latitudinal hemisphere encompassing Hadley Cell that accounts for the planet’s observed enhanced atmospheric surface warming. Using our model, we explore the form, nature and geological timing of the climatic transition that turned Venus from a paleo water world into a high-temperature, high-pressure carbon dioxide world.
    VL  - 4
    IS  - 1
    ER  - 

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Author Information
  • Mulholland Geoscience, Weybridge, Surrey, UK

  • Mulholland Geoscience, Weybridge, Surrey, UK

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