Vacationing on Venus Basic Geology Series Part 1
Guest post by Steven Goddard
Magellan radar imaged Venus – NASA Image
In some ways, Venus is similar to earth. It is about the same size as the earth, has a nickel-iron core, and has volcanic activity due to radioactive heating in the interior. But that is where the similarities end. Venus has some serious problems as a vacation spot – mainly that it is extremely hot and the atmosphere is a thick cloud of sulfuric acid, CO2 and other unpleasant chemicals.
So how did Venus get to be like that, and why is the earth different?
- Venus is closer to the sun, which makes it hotter and prevents formation of oceans due to excessive evaporation.
- Venus suffered a traumatic collision in it’s early days, which causes it to rotate very slowly and parallel to the ecliptic. This makes for long afternoons (thousands of hours long) which get extremely hot.
- Because of 1 and 2, Venus was never able to sequester CO2 in limestones like the earth.
For the last few billion years, volcanoes on earth have been spewing out the greenhouse gases H2O, CO2 and CH4, as well as, H2SO4, SO2, H2S, HCl and Cl2. If not for the oceans and limestone sequestration, we would have a very thick, hot acidic atmosphere like Venus which could not support life. Fortunately, temperatures and other conditions on earth were just right to allow huge volumes of CO2 to move into the oceans and precipitate carbonate rock layers, where the CO2 became sequestered. This makes earth the pleasant place which we all enjoy.
Wikipedia image – carbonate rocks in Italy, uplifted miles above sea level.
One of the oft stated concerns by the IPCC and others is excess CO2 from cement production, which involves heating carbonate rocks and has the side effect of returning CO2 to the atmosphere. Dr. Hansen and others have also suggested that periods of rapid warming in the past have been due to limestone formations being subducted into hot volcanic regions and losing their CO2 to the atmosphere.
But make no mistake, without the CO2 sequestered in limestone and other carbonate rocks, earth would be hot, toxic and probably unlivable – like Venus.
Some more detailed discussion here and here .
Part 2 will be a discussion of how fossil fuels fit into the picture.
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Hugo M (08:05:03) :
I do not want to engage in a barycenter discussion, and will say this. We have a calculated angular momentum graph that is very accurately produced from JPL data. That graph shows us a disturbance in the wave formation that is centered every 172 years back for 6000 years so far in my research. That same disturbance correlates to a large reduction in solar activity which can vary, and also correlates with Neptune & Uranus in conjunction.
The exact mechanism will come and is probably closer than the mechanism’s we are waiting on from the random number Dynamo theory…..like how they cant explain the modulation of the solar cycle, the timing of the solar cycle and how and why we have periods of grand minima. Planetary theory is miles ahead in that respect.
Anna said “Well, I am a physicist with a doctorate so I should know enough. ”
Bad scientist! I do agree with the fact you should know enough. You should know enough to know that kinda attitude NEVER coincides with someone who is brilliant at what they do.
I cannot say with any amount of certainty which of you is right. I do find it telling that you stay so rigidly within your comfort zone and anything outside of that zone you label “Science Fiction”. You treated someone who is obviously as educated as you claim to be with the same attitude had he said a purple space monster was to blame for it all.
I do know that the evidence for dark matter/energy, while gaining popularity in the mass media for it’s “exotic” nature, is still mostly conjecture revolving around questions that cannot be answered with the current system. So hey it’s got to be this funky stuff that no one can detect directly.
Before you start in on all the circumstantial evidence that has been collected let me say this. It is a lot like religion. You can’t see god are know for sure he is even there but every unexplained event is supposed to be proof that he exists. When the answer eludes you make one up then fight tooth and nail to bend everything towards that belief.
The guy with whom you disagreed sounded like someone who actually gets his hands dirty and is excited about his work. You sounded like you were reading a prepared statement with little or no enthusiasm.
Dark matter/energy is no more plausible than the theory you so flippantly dismissed. It just happens to be the popular theory of the day and if it proves to be the correct theory it will not validate you in my eyes simply because you chose to run your Doctorate flag up the pole then proceeded to spout off information readily available to anyone who visits space.com.
I don’t believe in god in the traditional sense but I am smart enough to pray every night just encase. An open mind. It’s the new drug. you should try it.