2.1.3 The enhanced greenhouse effect

Content

Geographic inquiry and concept(s)
- How natural and human processes affect the global energy balance
Geographic knowledge and understanding
- The enhanced greenhouse effect and international variations in greenhouse gas sources and emissions, in relation to economic development, globalization and trade
Case study or detailed examples
- Neither required by the syllabus
Aims of this lesson
- Be able to describe and explain the ‘enhanced greenhouse effect’.
- To have knowledge of international variations in greenhouse gas sources and emissions.
- Be able to discuss the geographical linkages between greenhouse gas emissions/sources, economic development, globalisation and trade.

Even as Trump’s pledge to ‘drill, baby, drill’ is hampered by tariff chaos, analysis shows surge in planet-heating emissions

The Guardian · 2 May 2025

Economic development
- The process whereby simple, low-income national economies are transformed into modern industrial economies.

Emissions
- The release of substances — gases, particulates, or other materials — into the environment.

Enhanced greenhouse effect
- The impact of increasing levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as a result of human activities. It is often referred to as global warming, and it's important to distinguish it from the natural greenhouse effect, which is essential for life on Earth.

Globalisation
- ”the growing interdependence of countries worldwide through the increasing volume and variety of cross-border transactions in goods and services and of international capital flows, and through the more rapid and widespread diffusion of technology” [IMF]

Greenhouse gas
- Gases that trap heat in the atmosphere are called greenhouse gases.

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Explain how the melting of ice sheets can create a positive feedback loop that accelerates warming. [2]
Suggest two human activities, other than burning fossil fuels, that can change terrestrial albedo. [4]