Climatological processes influence attributes of the hydrological cycle. In midlatitudinal locations in North America, the intensity of precipitation results from the convergence of dissimilar air masses. When cold polar air collides with moist tropical air, extensive cyclonic storms result as the warmer tropical air is forced aloft. Continuous precipitation generates runoff which will flow into streams that usually lead into oceanic waters. Important factors affecting climate processes are latitudinal location, continentality, proximity to water areas, and relief.
Convectional currents moving within Earth s asthenosphere generate the geological cycle.
The asthenosphere is approximately 45 miles from the Earth s surface and separates the uppermost mantle from the mantle. While rocks in the uppermost mantle are rigid, rocks in the asthenosphere, because of pressure and radioactivity, are fluid. It is the circulation of convectional currents in the asthenosphere that move continental plates and it is the divergence and convergence of these plates that create mountains on the surface of the Earth. The evolution of Earth s physical landscape is a synthesis of these two processes. While geological processes create mountains, it is climatological action that wears them down.