Does the aurora borealis produce heat?

Answer 1

Actually, the aurora borealis isn't so much refracted light as much as it is trapped electrons, protons, and other heavier particles, being carried by the Earth's magnetic field towards the poles. Most of them come from the Sun via Solar Winds. It gives off light because these particles are charged and colliding with elements in the upper atmosphere, thus exciting them. Most of this energy is given off as light, which is what we see: green and red come from oxygen, low-level red and violet/blue from nitrogen. But I would imagine that some of the energy from the collisions is also given off as heat. It's probably incredibly small, nearly undetectable, but it may still be there.

Answer 2

Ions emitted from the solar (greater so in photograph voltaic flares) commute to Earth and have interaction with the Earth's magnetic field, this reasons Aurora Borealis/Aurora Australis (counting on which element of the equator you're on).

Answer 3

Not directly.

Charged particle ionize air atoms and molecules. When the electron is recaptured, a photon of light is emitted. The photon that reaches your eye creates an electrical impulse in your retina, which is then carried to your brain as an electrical signal. SInce no signal is ever carried with 100% efficiency, some heat will be generated inside your head. It is probably too small to be measured and I hesitate to launch into the equations needed to find out how small it would be. But it would not be exactly zero.

The photons that do not reach your eyes (or somebody else's eyes) will eventually be absorbed by matter and, eventually, dissipate their energy as heat (however, it could take many steps).

A photon of visible light carries approximately 3 eV of energy (blue, almost violet). This is equivalent to 5 x 10^-19 Joules.
It would take the total energy of over 2,000,000,000,000,000,000 photons of violet light to heat one gram of water by one degree C.

Of course, you'd need a lot more if the energy transfer is not perfectly efficient (and it never is, especially with water: it is transparent!).

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The idea that some heat could be generated makes sense as the photons represent the energy that was lost by the charged particles as they were slowed down by the atmosphere. This 'lost' kinetic energy eventually has to dissipate as heat.

Answer 4

I can't see how it could, it's just refracted light from the Earth's magnetic field... Honestly, there is no reason it would; but that is just intuition.