Is it true that the water on earth is at the same amount now as it was when it first appeared?

Question

My friend said that some evaporates into space!

Answer 1

Well the water at the surface, including ocean water, is very small compaired to all the water trapped in rocks deep below the surface. If anything I think there is slightly more water on earth now from nearby comets.

Answer 2

I think your friend is wrong . It doesn't evaporate into space as the earths gravitational feild is too strong. If water ( which is a very heavy substance ) could evaporate into space , what does he think would would happen to very light gasses like helium? It's been said that there are some molecules of water in your glass that william shakesphere drank. I don't know about that but if anyone can prove it they ought to find some and bottle them, they would make a fortune. actually water is burnt hydrogen, so there is actually MORE water now than when the earth was forming...........I don't know how the water companies DARE say there is a water shortage.

Answer 3

During the early formation of the Earth there was no solid crust, the Earth was a swirling ball of magma (much as it is inside, now actually). The temperature of molten magma, though variable is generally over 1000 deg C.

Now as we all know, the boiling point of water is 100 deg C, so until a solid surface formed and the temperature dropped below 100 C somewhere, there was no surface water. I think you will find that hydrogen and oxygen were released from various compounds and only then combined to form water, which gradually accumulated, increasingly so when simple life emerged and was supplemented regularly by watery comets and the like, which were very, very common in earlier days of the Solar System.

The water that emits from volcanoes and lava outpourings now has a different origin to that created by the original all-magma Earth.

Answer 4

There is no problem with the volume of water we have in the world , since 2/3 of the earth is sea, alot of it being several km in depth- an unimaginable amount.
Fresh water though, is a valuable resource because we recieve it only through rainfall charging up reserves. Nearly all the surface-water in lakes, inland seas, rivers etc are used for frivelous and selfish purposes, so there is much less of it than there should be.
I think what some others said about low atomic numbers of Hydrogen and Oxygen made sense in relation to your water/space question.
The water was created because of chemical processes billions of years ago when earth became less like a ball of molten rock and started to generate an atmosphere from the steam. The building blocks for an atmosphere were there as soon as earth was an entity in itself, but there is only so much mass of all the matter for which we can bring together the hydrogen and 2 oxygens it takes to make 'h2o'.

Answer 5

Yes of course!

Where would we get additional water from otherwise? Earth is the only inner planet in our solar system that has liquid water on its surface.
Or where would earth's water go? Earth is a "closed system," like a terrarium, which means that the Earth neither gains nor loses much matter, including water.
Although some matter, such as meteors from outer space, are captured by Earth, very little of Earth's substances escape into outer space. This is certainly true about water.
This means that the same water that existed on Earth millions of years ago is still here.
Earth's water is always in circulation and has been recycled for the last 3 billion years!

Answer 6

Not really. Water is a molecule made up of 2 hydrogen atoms and 1 oxygen atom and it can be broken up in many ways.
At the same time some hydrogen will certainly be lost into space but every icy meteor or meteorite that enters the atmosphere will add to the oxy-hydrogen content. So the overall amounts are constantly varying.

Answer 7

No. Water can be lost to space by the action of the solar winds but we also gain water by cosmic particals and comets as some have stated. Also water constantly rises from within the earth through cracks from the original water from the formation of the earth and is sometimes emitted from volcanoes. The water emitted through volcanoes is sometimes recycled from previous water at the surface that was dragged down by a subducting plate.

Answer 8

Yes, the amount of water on Earth has never decreased. This is called the water cycle.
Ocean water evaporates to form clouds which eventually pour down on the earth. Rivers and streams take this water back to the sea.

Answer 9

No. When Earth was first cooling there was no water. Gases were released from the crust as it cooled. Our atmosphere was much different then. Gradually, water vapor was released,plus the gases that make water.
The amount of water on Earth has been constant for thousands of years. (Earth is 4.6 billion years old). It changes form, solid, liquid, and gas, but it is constant now

Answer 10

Some water molecules reach escape velocity and do escape permanently into space. That is why we don't have any free helium as helium molecules move faster than water molecules.

However the Earth also gains mass from meteors.