Texas A&M University (TAMU) ATMO 201 Weather and Climate Exam 1 Practice

Adiabatic compression during descent raises the air parcel’s temperature. When air sinks, it moves into higher surrounding pressure, so it is compressed. Because no heat is exchanged with the environment in an adiabatic process, the compression raises the parcel’s internal energy, warming it. This is why descending air is described as warming and compressing.

The other ideas mix incompatible effects: expansion tends to cool air, so describing descent with expansion would be inconsistent; compressing and cooling would require heat loss or another process, not a pure adiabatic compression, and describing warming with expansion contradicts the basic idea of compression warming.