can earth be electricaly charged ?why?

Question

earth is zero charge ,,but this should has some limit?

if it is already charged!!is it negative or positive charge?then we should be charged too!.if chareged and rotating what a huge magnet field , and what is its effect?

Answer 1

I wanted to answer this one, but lithiumdeuteride beat me to it. He always gets here before me :(

Answer 2

Yes, the Earth can be electrically charged - but not by very much.

The electrical force is so much stronger than the gravitational force that an unbalanced electrical charge would lead to extremely large electrical forces, greatly exceeding the gravitational.

The result is that electrical imbalances work themselves out pretty quickly. For example, since there are cosmic rays coming from the Sun and from distant sources, and these are nearly all charged positively or negatively, any residual charge on the Earth would quickly attract or repel, grab or drive away, opposite or identical charges, such that its total charge would quickly be neutralized.

How much of an imbalance could be maintained? Here's a way to estimate it (I won't work it out completely, I'm getting too sleepy):

- The electrical force between an electron (charge Q-e) and the Earth (if it has a charge Q-E) is, in CGS units,
F-e = (Q-e)(Q-E)/R^2, where R = distance from the electron to the center of the Earth.

- The gravitational force between an electron (mass m-e) and the Earth (m-E) is:
F-g = G(m-e)(m-E)/R^2

Therefore, the ratio between these forces at any distance is:
F-g/F-e = G(m-e)(m-E)/((Q-e)(Q-E))

At what value of Q-E would this ratio = 1 ?
It happens when:
Q-E = G(m-e)(m-E)/Q-e

Actually, an interesting number would be the number of electrons it would take to do this, Q-E/Q-e:

Q-E/Q-e = G(m-e)(m-E)/(Q-e)^2
G = 6.67e-8
m-e = 9.11e-28
m-E = 5.98e27
Q-e = 4.8e-10

I get Q-E/Q-e = 1.58e12

That means that you need 10e12 electrons to cancel out the Earth's gravity, so you will be limited to even a small percentage of that before the stream of electrons coming from the Sun would cancel it out, either by joining the Earth (if there were a deficit of electrons) or by staying away, and letting the excess protons be captured.

Answer 3

If the earth were electrically neutral, it would be an astonishing coincidence. Earth is continually exposed to the solar wind and other bombardments of charged particles. Given the high mobility of electrons, I suspect even the daily fluctuation is in the millions. If you don't count atmospheric electrons as part of earth's charge, the number changes by at least trillions with every lightning strike.

Perhaps the Van Allen belts or the magnetosphere cause a steady-state net charge. I'll leave that to your research.

Answer 4

The electric force is so strong compared to gravity that even a small charge imbalance (1% too many or too few electrons) would have disastrous consequences for the Earth, causing it to fly apart.

To the best of our understanding, there is exactly as much positive charge as there is negative charge in the universe. Physicists don't know why this is the case, only that it seems to be true.

Answer 5

.Earth is not zero charge. The geomagnetic field is not neutral and our magnetosphere maintains a charge as it interacts with the solar wind. The difference is so small that it appears to be zero, but it actually cannot be, there must be a very very very small difference for life to exist on this planet.

This would be similar to saying our planet is a perfect sphere. It is not, our planet is a spheroid. It has to have some "imperfection" to for life to exist. Or "movement" to its shape - same with Earth "charge" it must have movement to it around the zero point.

Answer 6

Well, I probably shouldn't be answering since I have no real source or anything but here's what I randomly remembered hearing: That the magma inside the earth actually does have an electromagnetic force. So it could be somewhat?

Answer 7

too much electricty would causa all power to go out, or possibly start a fire.