Course
How the planet holds its heat
Work out where the extra heat comes from, where it goes, and why swapping the energy behind it is slow.
The shape of it
15 lessons
About 71 minutes in total. Your progress is kept on this device — no account, nothing sent anywhere.
Course complete
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The lessons
The blanket
4 lessons · about 19 min01Sunlight in, heat out
Work out why a planet settles at one temperature and not another.
About 5 min
02The blanket that lets light through
Explain how a few gases keep the ground about 33 degrees warmer than bare rock would be.
About 5 min
03A bath with the tap open
Tell apart cutting how fast carbon goes up and bringing the amount down.
About 5 min
04Old carbon and new carbon
Tell apart carbon that was already going round and carbon dug up from the ground.
About 5 min
What one degree does
4 lessons · about 18 min05The average moves, the edges jump
Work out why a small rise in the average makes rare hot days common.
About 5 min
06Weather is not climate
Spot a trend inside a wobbly line, and tell a cold week from a cooling world.
About 5 min
07The ocean is the store
Trace where the extra heat goes, and why the sea rises even before ice is counted.
About 5 min
08The slow parts keep moving
Predict which changes stop when warming stops, and which carry on for centuries.
About 5 min
Where the energy comes from
4 lessons · about 19 min09Four fifths from the ground
Work out how much of the world's energy still comes from coal, oil and gas, and where it goes.
About 5 min
10The price that leaves out the harm
Spot a cost that lands on someone who was not part of the sale.
About 5 min
11The grid must balance every second
Explain why electricity from wind and sun is cheap to make and hard to rely on.
About 5 min
12Built things get cheaper, dug things do not
Work out why a solar panel's price falls every year and coal's does not.
About 5 min
Changing it
3 lessons · about 15 min13Electrify, then clean the electricity
Trace why most plans start by turning a burning job into an electric one.
About 5 min
14The hard third
Name the things that cannot simply be plugged in, and the wall each one runs into.
About 5 min
15Taking a climate headline apart
Spot which of the course's five ideas a real headline is about.
About 5 min