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Carbon
Dioxide: Precipitation In addition to increasing the energy in the atmosphere--and thus increasing the intensity of weather events-- elevated temperatures can cause increased evaporation from the earth's surface. This may lead to declines in the amount of precipitation at lower latitudes and increases in the amount of precipitation at higher latitudes. At lower latitudes, the temperature would be warmest. There would be much evaporation from these regions. The highly energized air would then carry the water vapor to higher latitudes. The excess water would eventually fall out as increased precipitation over these regions. Over the past century, this trend has been observed. Although precipitation has increased globally by about 1% in the past century, the amount of precipitation in tropical areas has declined. At the same time, there has been nearly a 5% net increase in precipitation across the United States. Precipitation trends across the United States for the past 100 years can be seen in the figure above. Image: Precipitation trends across the United States from 1900 to the present. Figure courtesy of the United States Environmental Protection Agency.
Overview
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Temperature ..|..
Precipitation
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