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Earth’s Axis Tilted
The Earth’s axis has tilted by 31.5 inches (about 80 centimetres), new research has found. The research blames human activity (pumping groundwater on a large scale) for impacting the planet’s rotation.
What has the study found?
- Researchers studied data from 1993 to 2010 to discover that pumping 2,150 gigatonnes of groundwater has led to a change in Earth’s tilt of nearly 31.5 inches. This is equivalent to .24 inches of sea level rise.
- The pumping is mainly for irrigation and human consumption, with the groundwater subsequently moving to the oceans.
- Redistributing water from the midlatitudes had the biggest impact on the Earth’s rotation, as per the study. Researchers identified water movement from western North America and northwestern India as playing a key role in the Earth’s tilt.
How Does Earth's Tilt Change?
- The axis of rotation of the Earth is tilted at an angle of 5 degrees away from vertical, perpendicular to the plane of our planet's orbit around the sun. The tilt of the Earth's axis is important, in that it governs the warming strength of the sun's energy.
- Due to this axial tilt, the sun shines on different latitudes at different angles throughout the year. This causes the seasons.
- Earth's tilt, or axial precession, is influenced by the distribution of mass (in this case water) across the planet.
- The melting of glaciers and polar ice sheets from Greenland and Antarctica contributes significantly to this redistribution.
- As ice melts, the water flows toward the equator, altering Earth's balance and causing its axis to shift - a process akin to how a figure skater's spin slows when their arms extend outward.
Fact Box: Groundwater
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