7 replies to this topic

[charlotte]

Let's see what answers we can gather for this one.

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If cold air sinks and warm air rises, why is it cold on mountains?

[Shimba]

higher up... a bit more weather going on up there... rising air causing winds etc...

[big-will]

Warm air is less dense than cold air when the two amounts of air are the same pressure. The air pressure decreases as we go up the mountain, and even though the air becomes colder it is still less dense than the warmer air below. The main reason why it is cold on mountains is because the decreased air pressure reduces the 'greenhouse effect' that traps heat below the mountains.

[Fattwins]

Good answer.

[Toque]

Because mountains are cool and if they were dorky they would be hot

[BagOfCrisps]

Now I understand that one.

[big-will]

Thanks Fattwins, quite proud of that one.

[Plucky]

A rough rule of thumb is that for every 1000 feet of elevation you gain, you can expect between a 3.5 and 5 degree F temperature drop.

To expand on what Big Will said (which is right on), air at higher elevations is under lower pressure which means that the air molecules have more separation between one another. Heat is generally created from the interaction of molecules - the further spaced they are, the less interaction and the less heat that is produced. That's a simplistic explanation of course, because we all probably know what a temperature inversion is........ The study of complex climatology is so, well, complex. I dropped the class in grad school. I just didn't have the physics background for it

I like Toque's explanation though, even though it doesn't make much sense