To: tejek who wrote (273035 ) 2/9/2006 10:54:33 AM From: d[-_-]b Read Replies (2) | Respond to tejek,I know that its just plain wrong for the US to consume a 1/4 of the world's resources when it has only 3% of its population..........wrong on several levels. Show me a link where it says the most important gas in global warming is water vapor...... lwf.ncdc.noaa.gov Water Vapor is the most abundant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, which is why it is addressed here first. However, changes in its conentration is also considered to be a result of climate feedbacks related to the warming of the atmosphere rather than a direct result of industrialization. The feedback loop in which water is involved is critically important to projecting future climate change, but as yet is still fairly poorly measured and understood. However, huge scientific uncertainty exists in defining the extent and importance of this feedback loop. As water vapor increases in the atmosphere, more of it will eventually also condense into clouds, which are more able to reflect incoming solar radiation (thus allowing less energy to reach the Earth's surface and heat it up). The future monitoring of atmospheric processes involving water vapor will be critical to fully understand the feedbacks in the climate system leading to global climate change. As yet, though the basics of the hydrological cycle are fairly well understood, we have very little comprehension of the complexity of the feedback loops. Also, while we have good atmospheric measurements of other key greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane, we have poor measurements of global water vapor, so it is not certain by how much atmospheric concentrations have risen in recent decades or centuries, though satellite measurements, combined with balloon data and some in-situ ground measurements indicate generally positive trends in global water vapor.WTF is the problem with righties and this issue about not being wrong.
