Why is weather confined to the troposphere?
Generally speaking, weather phenomena in the atmosphere are primarily a function of temperature variations. Air temperature increases or decreases caused by the heating and cooling of the earth result in pressure variations (highs and lows) which, in turn, create air mass movement. Temperature variations, especially in areas of higher humidity, also result in the formation, composition, shape, height, etc. of clouds. The troposphere is the area of the atmosphere that extends from sea level up to an altitude of anywhere from approximately 5 to 7 miles and is characterized by a fairly constant drop in temperatures called the lapse rate. The tropopause also contains some 70% of the total mass of our atmosphere. Separating the troposphere from the stratosphere is the tropopause, an area where the temperature no longer decreases with altitude. Most, but not all, of our weather phenomena occur below the tropopause because that is the portion of our atmosphere with the most mass and the great
