Radiative cooling

If a hot and a cold body are allowed to interact by exchaning thermal radiation, the hotter body will transfer its heat to the colder body until radiative equilibrium[?] is achieved. If both bodies have the same radiation characteristics, they will eventually both have the same temperature.

Radiative cooling drives the large-scale circulation of the Earth's atmosphere, as the sun heats the Earth in the Tropics, whereas Earth heats outer space at the poles. Between equator and pole a turbulent atmospheric exchange sets in, transporting sensible heat and latent heat polewards via eddies, known as cyclones. Fortunately, this process will not attain radiative equilibrium[?] for a few billion years.