IRELAND

[!]
‘Two Irish scientists, John Tyndall and Sean Twomey, living a
century apart, can be said to be at both ends of the spectrum of
what we do and don’t know about climate change. In the 1850s
John Tyndall set out to answer the question: why is the Earth so
warm? The physics of his time suggested it should be a lot colder
than it clearly was. Tyndall built a remarkable instrument which
enabled him to identify the gases in the atmosphere that trap
energy which would otherwise escape to space. These gases
keep the Earth warm and are now known as greenhouse gases.
At the other end of the scientific spectrum, there is the
complexity of clouds. Each cloud droplet is formed around a
minute particle, typically less than one millionth of a meter in size.
In the 1930s there was a remarkable blossoming of this science
in Ireland. Sean Twomey was part of this. He developed the
theory of how particulate pollutants influence cloud structures,
changing their reflectivity, lifetimes and rainfall characteristic. His
breakthrough theory was published in 1977. The Twomey Effect
is still frequently referenced in today’s scientific literature.’
Frank McGovern, Head of Climate Change Research &
Science, Environmental Protection Agency, Ireland
Discovering
the deep and
e x p l o r i n g
the unknown
discovery Ireland 52,53
All photographs for this chapter courtesy of Sabrina Renken