Could a propulsion system be devised that can alter the earths orbit?

Question

If we move even a fraction away from the Sun, couldn't that decrease global warming enough to 'buy' us time?

Answer 1

No.

Although we do change Earths trajectory every time we even move. When you jump, the earth pulls you down few feet, but your gravity also pulls the Earth towards you a few atometers. But that's more of a technicality.

But the kind of change you're talking about is very hard to do. First, you'd have to over some some six and a half sextillion tons of molten iron, nickel, and silicone booking around the sun at nineteen miles per second to give it a new trajectory. You'd also have to calculate precisely how far off ocurse you'd want us to go, because a little difference snowballs to a very big Change.

Even if you did accomplish that, Kepler reminds us that PLANETS ORBIT IN ELLIPSES! If you were to kick us off course on one side, the planet would get alot closer on the other side which would only make the situation you're trying to solve worse. And, it would take so much fuel to power the propulsion device, it in itself would be by far the greatest polluter on the planet.

I'm sorry, but it's just not going to work.

Answer 2

It would have to be mighty damned big, that much I can tell you. Maybe in a few more centuries we might be able to do it, but I think it's definitely beyond our abilities at the present time. Also, who knows what other delicate balance of gravity in the solar system we could screw up? We don't need any asteroids suddenly diving our way. Did you plan to make sure we take the moon with us when we move? Personally, I'd rather miss it if it were off on an orbit of its own.

We could alter the poles at least just by a very major Earth moving project. All we'd have to do is to move a mass of earth about the size of the moon from the place in northern hemisphere where you want the new north pole to be to any place 6,250 miles from there. Then just sit back and wait. Due to the lopsided weight distribution of the Earth, the north pole should move to place from where you took the dirt and the place you dumped it, being one fourth of the Earth's diameter away, will be on the new equator. You may want to check this plan with professional engineers before you continue,as I can't really say I know what the hell I'm talking about. I just sit around late at night and dream up this crap.

Answer 3

Not this side of the year 3000, probably.

The way you would "move" the Earth would be to get a series of asteroids in an orbit along the same "line" you want the Earth to move, over many hundreds of years, these asteroids would have a cumulative effect of moving the Earth a few inches per year. Over several thousand years, you could probably move the Earth a few feet outwards in whatever direction you wanted.

But I ask you, if we could move asteroids about, and keep them where we want for hundreds or thousands of years, the GW issue would be kids-play to solve.

As far as buying ourselves time, yeah that we can do already, but we won't.

1. Buying a hybrid car, using those festive and expensive curly lightbulbs and living very close to your work or school are important and practical steps, eating less meat and buying from local farmers is probably the best bunch of things we can do individually.

2. At a societal level, We can insist that power producers use wind,solar and nuclear and we need to be willing to pay for increased power costs.

3. At a governmental level, we need to elect politicians who even occasionally do what we elect them to do and stop working for corporations rather than "the people".

4. As a nation, we need to stop paying funding terrorism with our SUV's and improve education of the people ESPECIALLY in science and mathematics, so they can understand WTF is at stake.

5. As a planet, the US and European nations need top help China , India, Africa and the Americas to get Wind and Solar and Nuclear and CLEANER Coal refineries online.

We may not be able to prevent Global warming but we can do things to make it not so bad.

I view global warming like being told with certainty that I have to drive and I will have an accident tomorrow, we can't prevent it but we have a choice.

Do we want to get on the expressway and push 80MPH all day waiting for the appointment with the grim reaper? OR
Do we choose to take back-roads get a car with airbags galore and wear our seatbelts and don't drive very fast tomorrow.

I'm going with the back-roads,air bags and easy going.
It's not bravado or cool but it's the smart way to go.

Answer 4

The only way to do this is by throwing matter into space towards the sun... It happens when we launch a satellite but the mass of the earth is so vast in comparison to what we launch the effect is negligible (Literally).

Remember that momentum is constant in a sealed system, you'd have to spend the worlds energy usage for a year to launch enough matter to make a difference, and you;d have to make sure none of it came back down or the attractive force of gravity cancels out all that work you put in !

Answer 5

quite, *each* collision Earth has - from the 6-mile-huge rock that wiped out the dinosaurs, to the sand grains that we see as capturing stars - impact it incredibly is orbit, a splash. For the main section, the collisions we've are very low-potential; they are brought about via the Earth's gravitational allure on products already orbiting the solar interior the comparable direction we are... So, whilst the 6-mile rock hit us, it became into shifting at 30,000 to 40,000 miles according to hour relative to the Earth; a number of that velocity is attributed to it incredibly is very own orbit, yet plenty if no longer maximum of it became into because of the fact it "fell" to Earth - so Earth's gravity pulled it in, yet on the comparable time, the gravitational pull from the rock pulled in the worldwide, too. the internet effect became into in all probability too little to degree (it may desire to've accelerated our direction proper to the solar, or slowed us down) - undergo in ideas, it incredibly is 6 miles huge, Earth is 8,000. to fantastically impact Earth's orbit, it may desire to be a planet-sized merchandise, and the impact could desire to be *sluggish*..... As for the outcomes - any impact from an merchandise super adequate to truly stumble on an orbital exchange is going to smash the Earth - in all probability turn the entire floor molten, and... various billion years from now, existence could desire to start returned.

Answer 6

Let me suggest to you that a much easier solution would be to begin doing something rather positive that everyone on Earth can do right now...

That is to begin painting all black asphalt highways, roads, parking lots, and driveways with the same paint that is presently used to place white lines down the highways. The stupidest thing in the world is to pave the Earth's surface with BLACK ASPHALT. It sucks up the Sun's heat radiation and retains it longer than anything out there that is light in color.

Similarly, you could begin re-roofing your house with WHITE ROOF SHINGLES, or painting your roof WHITE instead of BLACK.

Answer 7

And then, when we've reduced the Carbon Dioxide emissions, we can just "put 'er into gear and move 'er back where she was", eh? Like parking a car.

I can't bring myself to do the math. How much gasoline would we burn to do that, eh? And what are we going to do about the poor Moon?

It's one heck of a lot less problem to reduce the emissions than to try to solve global warming that way.

Answer 8

You know , this is the only planet PROVEN to have life,and,
we are in the only known zone around the Sun that allows life to flourish....why do you want to mess with that too?
orbit has ZERO to do with global warming.
the mechanisms for holding heat on this planet are:
1- oceans
2- atmosphere......and how much have we mess up those?

the other problem is the inertia of a planetary body, already in motion.
sorry.....no way.

Answer 9

No. The earth is simply too big for any conceivable propulsion system to make a difference.

Answer 10

That would require MASSIVE AMOUNT OF ENERGY. Plus if we got out of our orbit, our planet would be totally screwed... The temperature would wildly swing and all eco system would we destroyed. Plus we would probably hit the moon, causing our world to end. I think we should try this though :P