[Lewis Thomson (OP)]

Rob would like to know the following,

"I'm intrigued in the distance of the Sun to the Earth, and, for as far long back we have recorded, I would like to see the change over the last 20 Years. Also do we have a real-time data collector of this distance?"

Leave your insights in the comments below...

[Origin]

"I'm intrigued in the distance of the Sun to the Earth, and, for as far long back we have recorded, I would like to see the change over the last 20 Years.

The average distance between the earth and sun has increased approximately 300 cm.

Also do we have a real-time data collector of this distance?

Sure, you can bounce radar beams off the sun and other bodies to calculate the distance.

[evan_au]

The distance between the Earth and the Sun varies by about 5 million kilometers over the course of a year.
- This is because Earth's orbit is an ellipse, coming closest to the Sun in January, and farthest away in July.
- This was discovered by Kepler, and replaced the earlier idea that motions in the heavens had to be based on perfect circles (and when that didn't work, on circles rolling upon circles, only that didn't work so well, either...)

Farthest distance from the Sun (Aphelion, around 4th July every year): 152 million km (94,500,000 miles)
Closest approach to the Sun (Perihelion, around 4th January every year): 147 million km (91,401,000 miles)
The exact date varies by ±1 day due to leap years...

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth

[R2000]

Im the one that asked the question; and thank you for posting this Origin.

I would like to know if this distance is a big cause of Climate change.

I see from posts that the distance does change, though is there an on going change that is climbing (a distance change or orbit change), and not staying nominal?

[chiralSPO]

Im the one that asked the question; and thank you for posting this Origin.

I would like to know if this distance is a big cause of Climate change.

I see from posts that the distance does change, though is there an on going change that is climbing (a distance change or orbit change), and not staying nominal?

It can have an effect to some extent, and there are some cyclical changes in earth's orbit (see more here: https://www.fs.usda.gov/ccrc/education/climate-primer/natural-climate-cycles)

But the current (fast) changes in the climate are driven primarily by greenhouse gases (mostly carbon dioxide and methane).

We can see the effects of the cycles, as well as the recent trends (the practically vertical line at the far right) by looking at atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations found in ice cores, the record of which goes back almost a million years (https://keelingcurve.ucsd.edu/)

co2_800k.png (110.13 kB . 1000x600 - viewed 2886 times)

[Halc]

The chart at the bottom of the last post shows the natural cycles quite well. One can track the ice ages for instance.  Note that the current CO₂ levels are well over 400 and climbing at an unprecedented rate, pretty much at the top of the chart above that otherwise has stayed below 300 for the last million years.

There are cycles of high eccentricity to near-circular orbits. I think the moon plays a significant role in this

The primary drivers of the changing average distance of Earth is (in decreasing order of significance):
1) Solar tides, driving Earth away from the sun, energy being supplied by spin of Earth.
2) Mass of sun decreasing, also driving Earth away as solar gravity cannot maintain the orbital distance
3) Friction with meteors and such, driving the orbit lower
4) Gravitational waves, decreasing the orbital energy at the rate of about 200 watts.

1 will continue to fade until Earth becomes tide-locked with the sun, which happens long after the sun goes nova and potentially swallows the Earth.
2 will continue until the sun burns out, if Earth is still there during this lingering phase
3 Friction will decrease as free objects continue to be absorbed
4 will always be there, and will swallow all planets that survive in the long run.

None of these four have a significant short term impact on climate.

[gem]

Hi all 

Halc you raise some interesting points.
The primary drivers of the changing average distance of Earth is (in decreasing order of significance):
1) Solar tides, driving Earth away from the sun, energy being supplied by spin of Earth.
2) Mass of sun decreasing, also driving Earth away as solar gravity cannot maintain the orbital distance
3) Friction with meteors and such, driving the orbit lower
4) Gravitational waves, decreasing the orbital energy at the rate of about 200 watts.

Could we explore them please,
1) I am assuming this refers to the delta of the suns field across the Earth, due to the inverse square law and the frictional coupling between the solid surface and the tidal bulge effectively forcing the bulge ahead of there center lines, therefore constantly pumping water up in the Sun's gravitational field.
What value of energy are you placing on this aspect from the spin of the Earth ?

2) I believe I understand this point

3) Why does the friction of meteors favour one direction ?

4) Could you expand where/how the rate of 200 Watts is derived for the Earth Sun orbital energy/distance.   

[Halc]

1) Solar tides, driving Earth away from the sun, energy being supplied by spin of Earth.
...
I am assuming this refers to the delta of the suns field across the Earth, due to the inverse square law and the frictional coupling between the solid surface and the tidal bulge effectively forcing the bulge ahead of there center lines, therefore constantly pumping water up in the Sun's gravitational field.
What value of energy are you placing on this aspect from the spin of the Earth ?

It isn't an energy thing. The vast majority (over 99%, about 97% for lunar tides) of the energy dissipates as heat. Its the angular momentum that counts since that cannot just be radiated into space, so trick is to figure out what the torque is on Earth, and what percentage of that torque is from the sun (about 30% I think). Due to this torque, the current length of day is near 24 hours, up from probably single digits billions of years ago back when lunar tides accounted for a larger percentage of the torque.
It isn't just a water thing. Earth exerts tidal force on the moon despite it being tide locked with Earth, deforming it, which generates heat as it rocks back and forth. This energy loss is slowly translated into a less eccentric orbit. The moon's orbit is more circular than it used to be.
Similarly, the tidal forces on Earth deform the crust, generating heat in addition to that generated by water friction.

3) Why does the friction of meteors favour one direction ?

It doesn't much. Most debris in the neighborhood of Earth's orbit is part of the solar system and is likely to already have angular momentum about the sun in the same direction as everything else. But there's still randomness to it, and movement through a cloud is probably going to slow you down via friction unless the cloud is moving faster than you on average, which is unlikely  for any collection of material at Earth's orbit.

4) Could you expand where/how the rate of 200 Watts is derived for the Earth Sun orbital energy/distance.

I looked it up. Wiki gravitational wave page: "the total energy of the Earth orbiting the Sun (kinetic energy + gravitational potential energy) is about 1.14×1036 joules of which only 200 watts (joules per second) is lost through gravitational radiation, leading to a decay in the orbit by about 1×10−15 meters per day or roughly the diameter of a proton."
You are free to work out that figure for yourself. I sure didn't.

The list is in order of current significance, but if it survives long enough (doesn't die when the sun expands), the order will change.
1) The planet will eventually get tide locked, and #1 goes completely away. It will slow for billions more years until the day is about 1500 hours long, then it will speed up for even longer until the day shortens once again to around 10 hours or less. Then it will slow again until finally getting tide locked. It's a long time, possibly over a trillion years. Don't wait up.
2) Long before that, the sun will cease combusting its materials at a rate faster than new material falls in. #2 will cease and then reverse.
3) The solar system might slowly get cleaned of debris, but new stuff will probably always wander by. I can't see #3 getting to zero in any reasonable time
4) Gravitational waves will never go away until the Earth falls into the sun. They'll increase as the orbital radius decreases, just like we only measure the waves from black hole mergers when they get really close.
All the planets will eventually fall into the sun barring a different calamity happen first, just as the sun and all the other stars will fall into the center of the galaxy, which of course will not happen since the alternate calamity (Andromeda eating us) will definitely happen first.
The Virgo supercluster and the Great Attractor are looking to eat all the galaxies in our local group, but we'll never reach them despite our current 600 km/sec velocity in that direction.

[gem]

Hi all 

Ok  Halc you make a lot of valid points, and as you have already stated not much to do with the original post, so I will probably start another post around the apparent change of opinion regarding energy's influence in the dynamic you were describing.

Halc : my bold

1) Solar tides, driving Earth away from the sun, energy being supplied by spin of Earth.

Changes to this in your following post,

It isn't an energy thing. The vast majority (over 99%, about 97% for lunar tides) of the energy dissipates as heat. Its the angular momentum that counts since that cannot just be radiated into space,

Given you state the energy is supplied from the earths rotation and radiates out into space, you cannot dismiss/separate the relationship between rotational momentum and rotational kinetic energy of a body.

(energy is the currency of the physical world)





http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/rke.html

[Rocky6419]

Hi everyone;
                    No, it's not true, Earth's average distance to the Sun does not change. The distance from Earth to Sun is still the same as before.

[Kryptid]

Hi everyone;
                    No, it's not true, Earth's average distance to the Sun does not change. The distance from Earth to Sun is still the same as before.

That's incorrect. Due to tidal acceleration and the loss of mass from the Sun, the average distance between the Sun and the Earth has been slowly increasing over time.