British Sign Language Glossaries of Curriculum Terms

BSL Environmental Science Glossary - Temperature inversions definition

Definition: In the Earth's troposphere, normally, it is warm near the earth and as the air travels further away up in the atmosphere, it cools and becomes cold high up. This ensures that gases are able to dissipate because they are warm and then cool down. However, with temperature inversions, the opposite happens. When there is pollution on the Earth, the temperature of the air near the ground is cool. The pollution makes the air thick and dense so the gas molecules don't move very fast. So the air stays cold and heavy, blanketing the ground. The air above the troposphere is actually warmer than the polluted air in this case, and this means that gases stay cold and can't escape the troposphere to dissipate. They stay trapped in the troposphere, cold and increasing all the time, worsening pollution.