Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-chemistry-course-of-the-year-4-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2022/paper-id/1/c/solution
Past exam of the chemistry course of the year 4 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2022 Interdisciplinary paper IDP1 1 c Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-20
The global warming potential compares equal-mass pulses, while the tabulated greenhouse gas radiative efficiencies are per ppb. For a fixed emitted mass, the initial mixing ratio is inversely proportional to molar mass. The molecular formulas give approximately for and for . Thus the ratio of mass-based greenhouse gas radiative efficiencies is .
In the standard one-box interpretation, the two quoted removal times represent independent first-order sinks acting on the burden. Their rates add, givingFor exponential pulse removal, the time-integrated abundance is proportional to . Dividing the replacement's forcing integral by the CFC-11 integral cancels the unknown carbon-dioxide reference integral:The finite-horizon factor for CFC-11 is important: , not one. Omitting the molar-mass correction would incorrectly compare equal-ppb rather than equal-mass pulses.
This is about 76 times smaller than the stated CFC-11 value, because rapid tropospheric removal outweighs the fairly similar per-ppb greenhouse gas radiative efficiencies. It still represents appreciable warming per emitted mass. If the shorter lifetime alone is used as the troposphere-dominated approximation, the result is , close to the combined-rate result. If the two given lifetimes instead describe separate local compartments, an exact two-box calculation would also require exchange rates and burden partitioning; those are not supplied. The boxed result states the usual one-box assumption explicitly.
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