Future of Earth
Futures studies |
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Concepts |
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Techniques |
Technology assessment and forecasting |
The biological and geological future of Earth can be
Over time intervals of hundreds of millions of years, random celestial events pose a global risk to the
The luminosity of the Sun will steadily increase, causing a rise in the solar radiation reaching Earth and resulting in a higher rate of weathering of silicate minerals. This will affect the carbonate–silicate cycle, which will cause a decrease in the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. In about 600 million years from now, the level of carbon dioxide will fall below the level needed to sustain C3 carbon fixation photosynthesis used by trees. Some plants use the C4 carbon fixation method to persist at carbon dioxide concentrations as low as ten parts per million. However, the long-term trend is for plant life to die off altogether. The extinction of plants will be the demise of almost all animal life since plants are the base of much of the animal food chain on Earth.[12][13]
In about one billion years the solar luminosity will be 10% higher, causing the atmosphere to become a "moist greenhouse", resulting in a runaway evaporation of the oceans. As a likely consequence, plate tectonics and the entire carbon cycle will end.[14] Following this event, in about 2–3 billion years, the planet's magnetic dynamo may cease, causing the magnetosphere to decay and leading to an accelerated loss of volatiles from the outer atmosphere. Four billion years from now, the increase in Earth's surface temperature will cause a runaway greenhouse effect, creating conditions more extreme than present-day Venus and heating Earth's surface enough to melt it. By that point, all life on Earth will be extinct.[15][16] Finally, the most probable fate of the planet is absorption by the Sun in about 7.5 billion years, after the star has entered the red giant phase and expanded beyond the planet's current orbit.[17]
Human influence
Humans play a key role in the
The consequences of a persistent biotic crisis have been predicted to last for at least five million years.
There are
Should the human species become extinct, then the various features assembled by humanity will begin to decay. The largest structures have an estimated decay
Cataclysmic astronomical events
As the Sun orbits the
The energy released from the impact of an
A
The incremental effect of
Orbit and rotation
The gravitational perturbations of the other planets in the Solar System combine to modify the
Glaciation
Historically, there have been cyclical
Earth is passing through an ice age known as the
Obliquity
The
Based on computer models, the presence of the Moon appears to stabilize the obliquity of the Earth, which may help the planet to avoid dramatic climate changes.[48] This stability is achieved because the Moon increases the precession rate of the Earth's rotation axis, thereby avoiding resonances between the precession of the rotation and precession of the planet's orbital plane (that is, the precession motion of the ecliptic).[49] However, as the semimajor axis of the Moon's orbit continues to increase, this stabilizing effect will diminish. At some point, perturbation effects will probably cause chaotic variations in the obliquity of the Earth, and the axial tilt may change by angles as high as 90° from the plane of the orbit. This is expected to occur between 1.5 and 4.5 billion years from now.[11]
A high obliquity would probably result in dramatic changes in the climate and may destroy the planet's
Geodynamics
In 10,000 years, the post-glacial rebound of the Baltic Sea will have reduced the depth by about 90 m (300 ft). The Hudson Bay will decrease in depth by 100 m over the same period.[37] After 100,000 years, the island of Hawaii will have shifted about 9 km (5.6 mi) to the northwest. The planet may be entering another glacial period by this time.[9]
Continental drift
The theory of plate tectonics demonstrates that the continents of the Earth are moving across the surface at the rate of a few centimeters per year. This is expected to continue, causing the plates to relocate and collide. Continental drift is facilitated by two factors: the energy generated within the planet and the presence of a
At present, the continents of North and South America are moving westward from Africa and Europe. Researchers have produced several scenarios about how this will continue in the future.
As the understanding of geodynamics improves, these models will be subject to revision. In 2008, for example, a computer simulation was used to predict that a reorganization of the mantle convection will occur over the next 100 million years, creating a new supercontinent composed of Africa, Eurasia, Australia, Antarctica and South America to form around Antarctica.[57]
Regardless of the outcome of the continental migration, the continued subduction process causes water to be transported to the mantle. After a billion years from the present, a geophysical model gives an estimate that 27% of the current ocean mass will have been subducted. If this process were to continue unmodified into the future, the subduction and release would reach an equilibrium after 65% of the current ocean mass has been subducted.[58]
Introversion
As this scenario continues, by 100 million years from the present, the continental spreading will have reached its maximum extent and the continents will then begin to coalesce. In 250 million years, North America will collide with Africa. South America will wrap around the southern tip of Africa. The result will be the formation of a new supercontinent (sometimes called
Extroversion
The first scientist to extrapolate the current motions of the continents was Canadian geologist
In an extroversion model, the closure of the Pacific Ocean would be complete in about 350 million years.[63] This marks the completion of the current supercontinent cycle, wherein the continents split apart and then rejoin each other about every 400–500 million years.[64] Once the supercontinent is built, plate tectonics may enter a period of inactivity as the rate of subduction drops by an order of magnitude. This period of stability could cause an increase in the mantle temperature at the rate of 30–100 °C (54–180 °F) every 100 million years, which is the minimum lifetime of past supercontinents. As a consequence, volcanic activity may increase.[56][63]
Supercontinent
The formation of a supercontinent can dramatically affect the environment. The collision of plates will result in
The formation of a supercontinent insulates the mantle. The flow of heat will be concentrated, resulting in volcanism and the flooding of large areas with basalt. Rifts will form and the supercontinent will split up once more. supercontinent.
Solidification of the outer core
The iron-rich core region of the Earth is divided into a 2,440 km (1,520 mi) diameter solid
The inner core is expected to consume most or all of the outer core 3–4 billion years from now, resulting in an almost completely solidified core composed of iron and other heavy elements. The surviving liquid envelope will mainly consist of lighter elements that will undergo less mixing.[73] Alternatively, if at some point plate tectonics cease, the interior will cool less efficiently, which would slow down or even stop the inner core's growth. In either case, this can result in the loss of the magnetic dynamo. Without a functioning dynamo, the magnetic field of the Earth will decay in a geologically short time period of roughly 10,000 years.[74] The loss of the magnetosphere will cause an increase in erosion of light elements, particularly hydrogen, from the Earth's outer atmosphere into space, resulting in less favorable conditions for life.[75]
Solar evolution
The energy generation of the Sun is based upon
At present, nearly half the hydrogen at the core has been consumed, with the remainder of the atoms consisting primarily of helium. As the number of hydrogen atoms per unit mass decreases, so too does their energy output provided through nuclear fusion. This results in a decrease in pressure support, which causes the core to contract until the increased density and temperature bring the core pressure into equilibrium with the layers above. The higher temperature causes the remaining hydrogen to undergo fusion at a more rapid rate, thereby generating the energy needed to maintain the equilibrium.[76]
The result of this process has been a steady increase in the energy output of the Sun. When the Sun first became a
By this time, the collision of the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies should be underway. Although this could result in the Solar System being ejected from the newly combined galaxy, it is considered unlikely to have any adverse effect on the Sun or its planets.[78][79]
Climate impact
The rate of weathering of
When the levels of carbon dioxide fall to the limit where photosynthesis is barely sustainable, the proportion of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is expected to oscillate up and down. This will allow land vegetation to flourish each time the level of carbon dioxide rises due to
The loss of higher plant life will result in the eventual loss of oxygen as well as ozone due to the respiration of animals, chemical reactions in the atmosphere, and volcanic eruptions. Modelling of the decline in oxygenation predicts that it may drop to 1% of the current atmospheric levels by one billion years from now.[89] This decline will result in less attenuation of DNA-damaging UV,[81] as well as the death of animals; the first animals to disappear would be large mammals, followed by small mammals, birds, amphibians and large fish, reptiles and small fish, and finally invertebrates.[12]
Before this happens, it is expected that life would concentrate at refugia of lower temperature such as high elevations where less land surface area is available, thus restricting population sizes. Smaller animals would survive better than larger ones because of lesser oxygen requirements, while birds would fare better than mammals thanks to their ability to travel large distances looking for cooler temperatures. Based on oxygen’s half-life in the atmosphere, animal life would last at most 100 million years after the loss of higher plants.[12] Some cyanobacteria and phytoplankton could outlive plants due to their tolerance for carbon dioxide levels as low as 1 ppm, and may survive for around the same time as animals before carbon dioxide becomes too depleted to support any form of photosynthesis.[12]
In their work
As temperatures continue to rise, the last of animal life will be driven toward the poles, and possibly underground. They would become primarily active during the
Loss of oceans
One billion years from now, about 27% of the modern ocean will have been subducted into the mantle. If this process were allowed to continue uninterrupted, it would reach an equilibrium state where 65% of the current surface reservoir would remain at the surface.[58] Once the solar luminosity is 10% higher than its current value, the average global surface temperature will rise to 320 K (47 °C; 116 °F). The atmosphere will become a "moist greenhouse" leading to a runaway evaporation of the oceans.[91][92] At this point, models of the Earth's future environment demonstrate that the stratosphere would contain increasing levels of water. These water molecules will be broken down through photodissociation by solar UV, allowing hydrogen to escape the atmosphere. The net result would be a loss of the world's seawater by about 1.1 billion years from the present.[93][94]
There will be one of two variations of this future warming feedback: the "moist greenhouse" where water vapor dominates the troposphere while water vapor starts to accumulate in the stratosphere (if the oceans evaporate very quickly), and the "runaway greenhouse" where water vapor becomes a dominant component of the atmosphere (if the oceans evaporate too slowly). In this ocean-free era, there will continue to be surface reservoirs as water is steadily released from the deep crust and mantle,[58] where it is estimated that there is an amount of water equivalent to several times that currently present in the Earth's oceans.[95] Some water may be retained at the poles and there may be occasional rainstorms, but for the most part, the planet would be a desert with large dunefields covering its equator, and a few salt flats on what was once the ocean floor, similar to the ones in the Atacama Desert in Chile.[14]
With no water to serve as a lubricant, plate tectonics would likely stop and the most visible signs of geological activity would be shield volcanoes located above mantle hotspots.[92][81] In these arid conditions the planet may retain some microbial and possibly even multicellular life.[92] Most of these microbes will be halophiles and life could find refuge in the atmosphere as has been proposed to have happened on Venus.[81] However, the increasingly extreme conditions will likely lead to the extinction of the prokaryotes between 1.6 billion years[90] and 2.8 billion years from now, with the last of them living in residual ponds of water at high latitudes and heights or in caverns with trapped ice. However, underground life could last longer.[12]
What proceeds after this depends on the level of tectonic activity. A steady release of carbon dioxide by volcanic eruption could cause the atmosphere to enter a "super-greenhouse" state like that of the planet Venus. But, as stated above, without surface water, plate tectonics would probably come to a halt and most of the carbonates would remain securely buried[14] until the Sun becomes a red giant and its increased luminosity heats the rock to the point of releasing the carbon dioxide.[95] However, as pointed out by Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee in their book The Life and Death of Planet Earth, according to NASA Ames scientist Kevin Zahnle, it is highly possible that plate tectonics may stop long before the loss of the oceans, due to the gradual cooling of the Earth's core, which could happen in just 500 million years. This could potentially turn the Earth back into a water world, and even perhaps drowning all remaining land life.[96]
The loss of the oceans could be delayed until 2 billion years in the future if the
By 2.8 billion years from now, the surface temperature of the Earth will have reached 422 K (149 °C; 300 °F), even at the poles. At this point, any remaining life will be extinguished due to the extreme conditions. What happens beyond this depends on how much water is left on the surface. If all of the water on Earth has evaporated by this point (via the "moist greenhouse" at ~1 Gyr from now), the planet will stay in the same conditions with a steady increase in the surface temperature until the Sun becomes a red giant.[92] If not and there are still pockets of water left, and they evaporate too slowly, then in about 3–4 billion years, once the amount of water vapor in the lower atmosphere rises to 40%, and the luminosity from the Sun reaches 35–40% more than its present-day value,[93] a "runaway greenhouse" effect will ensue, causing the atmosphere to warm and raising the surface temperature to around 1,600 K (1,330 °C; 2,420 °F). This is sufficient to melt the surface of the planet.[94][92] However, most of the atmosphere is expected to be retained until the Sun has entered the red giant stage.[97]
With the extinction of life, 2.8 billion years from now, it is expected that Earth's biosignatures will disappear, to be replaced by signatures caused by non-biological processes.[81]
Red giant stage
Once the Sun changes from burning hydrogen within its core to burning hydrogen in a shell around its core, the core will start to contract, and the outer envelope will expand. The total luminosity will steadily increase over the following billion years until it reaches 2,730 times its current
The most rapid part of the Sun's expansion into a red giant will occur during the final stages, when the Sun will be about 12 billion years old. It is likely to expand to swallow both Mercury and Venus, reaching a maximum radius of 1.2 AU (180 million km; 110 million mi). Earth will interact tidally with the Sun's outer atmosphere, which would decrease Earth's orbital radius. Drag from the chromosphere of the Sun would reduce Earth's orbit. These effects will counterbalance the impact of mass loss by the Sun, and the Sun will likely engulf Earth in about 7.59 billion years from now.[17]
The drag from the solar atmosphere may cause the orbit of the Moon to decay. Once the orbit of the Moon closes to a distance of 18,470 km (11,480 mi), it will cross Earth's Roche limit, meaning that tidal interaction with Earth would break apart the Moon, turning it into a ring system. Most of the orbiting rings will begin to decay, and the debris will impact Earth. Hence, even if the Sun does not swallow the Earth, the planet may be left moonless.[99] Furthermore, the ablation and vaporization caused by its fall on a decaying trajectory towards the Sun may remove Earth's mantle, leaving just its core, which will finally be destroyed after at most 200 years.[100][101] Earth's sole legacy will be a very slight increase (0.01%) of the solar metallicity following this event.[102]: IIC
Beyond and ultimate fate
After fusing helium in its core to carbon, the Sun will begin to collapse again, evolving into a compact white dwarf star after ejecting its outer atmosphere as a planetary nebula. The predicted final mass is 54% of the present value, most likely consisting primarily of carbon and oxygen.[1]
Currently, the Moon is moving away from Earth at a rate of 4 cm (1.6 inches) per year. In 50 billion years, if the Earth and Moon are not engulfed by the Sun, they will become
Beyond this point, the ultimate fate of the Earth (if it survives) depends on what happens. On a time scale of 1015 (1 quadrillion) years the remaining planets in the Solar System will be ejected from the system by close encounters with other stellar remnants, and Earth will continue to orbit through the galaxy for around 1019 years before it is ejected or falls into a
See also
- Eschatology – Part of theology concerned with the final events of history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity
- Circumstellar habitable zone– Orbits where planets may have liquid surface water
- Fermi paradox – Lack of evidence that aliens exist
- Formation and evolution of the Solar System – Modelling its structure and composition
- Global catastrophic risk, also known as Risks to civilization, humans, and planet Earth – Potentially harmful worldwide events
- Great Filter – Whatever prevents interstellar civilisations from arising from non-living matter
- History of Earth – Development of planet Earth from its formation to the present day
- Lava planet – Terrestrial planet with the surface covered by molten lava
- Medea hypothesis – Multicellular life may be self-destructive or suicidal
- Moving Earth – Planetary engineering scenario
- Planetary engineering – Influencing a planet's global environments
- Planetary habitability – Known extent to which a planet is suitable for life
- Rare Earth hypothesis – Hypothesis that complex extraterrestrial life is improbable and extremely rare
- Space and survival – Idea that long-term human presence requires to be spacefaring
- Speculative evolution – Science fiction genre exploring hypothetical scenarios in the evolution of life
- Stability of the Solar System – Long term dynamical interactions that disrupt the Solar System
- Timeline of the far future – Scientific projections regarding the far future
- Ultimate fate of the universe, also known as the end of the universe – Theories about the end of the universe
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Notes
- ^ See also: Life After People, about the decay of structures (if humans disappeared).
Further reading
- Scotese, Christopher R., PALEOMAP Project, retrieved August 28, 2009.
- Tonn, B. E. (March 2002), "Distant futures and the environment", Futures, 34 (2): 117–132, .