Anti-greenhouse effect

Many planetary bodies show the Green House Effect.

• In our solar System, Mars and Venus show the Green House Effect, but Titan, the largest planet of Saturn and Pluto, shows the opposite phenomena which is called Anti-Green House Effect.

Greenhouse effect occurs because the atmosphere transparent to solar radiation, but largely opaque to infrared and far infrared emitted by the planet / body.

But in anti-greenhouse effect, the atmosphere is opaque to solar but lets out infrared.

The effect is that the body is cooler than the actual temperature would have been. In case of Titan, both Green House Effect and Anti Green House Effect have been proved. Due to Green House Effect, the temperature goes up by 21K while, due to Anti-Green House effect, the temperature goes down by 9K. The result is that surface temperature is 12 K warmer than without atmosphere.

• At Pluto, there is different mechanism. Here, the sunlight causes the Nitrogen ice to sublimate which cools the body.