WUWT reader “ES” writes: It is not bad enough we have global warning but, now we have warming on the moon. “increased from 1.6 C to 3.5 C over the roughly six-year period measurements were being taken.”
Astronauts’ movement increased subsurface temperatures on the moon, study finds.
The presence of astronauts on the moon caused an unexpected warming of its subsurface temperatures for a period of time in the 1970s, a new study has found after delving into “lost” tapes from the Apollo missions.
In 1971 and 1972, NASA deployed sensors on the moon during the Apollo 15 and 17 missions in an effort to measure the moon’s surface and subsurface temperatures — a project dubbed the heat flow experiment.
Data was collected and beamed back down to Earth until 1977, where scientists were baffled by the gradual warming of the moon’s surface being read by the sensors.
NASA ultimately abandoned the research due to a lack of funding, and only some of the tapes were archived, with the others assumed lost, leaving scientists unable to analyze it further.
But those missing tapes were found recently in the National Archives, said study co-author Walter Kiefer, a senior staff scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute. He and his team spent years recovering and interpreting the data in order to pinpoint the source of the warming.
Specifically, the decades-old data showed the moon’s subsurface temperatures — in some areas as deep as three metres — increased from 1.6 C to 3.5 C over the roughly six-year period measurements were being taken.
Bright vs. dark
The moon consists primarily of two different types of rock: anorthosite and basalt. Anorthosite is light in colour and makes the moon bright, while basalt, which is common on Earth, is darker and appears as the maria, or “seas,” on the moon.
Lighter-coloured surfaces reflect more energy outward, while darker surfaces absorb energy.
Using photos from the extremely high-resolution camera aboard the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) orbiting the moon, the scientists determined that as astronauts walked or drove on the moon, it disturbed the anorthosite lunar soil — also known as regolith — left over from billions of years of bombardment from space rocks.
That disruption exposed the darker soil, which then absorbed more of the sun’s energy and ultimately raised the moon’s temperatures.
“You can actually see the astronauts tracks, where they walked,” Kiefer said. “And we can see … where they scuffed dirt up — and what it leaves behind is a darker path. In other words, the astronauts walking on the moon changed the structure of the regolith … in such a way that made it a little bit darker.”
Over years, that energy propagated downward and deeper into the lunar surface, which is what appeared on the newly acquired data record.
Eventually the temperatures would have reached an equilibrium as absorption stopped, said Kiefer, noting it may have already happened.
Since Neil Armstrong took those historic first steps on July 20, 1969, 11 others have walked on the moon.
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OMG OMG OMG… “the moon’s subsurface temperatures increased from 1.6ºC to 3.5ºC”
Let’s clarify the story. I’ve been through the supplementary information and what has been found in the data, over the course of 2-3 years is a warming of hardly 0.3K, or 0.3ºC, not 3.5ºC, which is what they THINK (didn’t measure) that the SURFACE would have warmed. This warming of course is not a warming of the moon’s subsurface temperatures as a whole, but at most perhaps a warming in the 5cm3 or so of lunar soil surrounding the sensor located more than 1m below the surface, which is what the sensor would measure.
I don’t know how this sensor transmitted the measured temperature. If it was via radio, then the electronics of the sensor itself could have been the cause of this really small warming of the surroundings. If it was via a cable to some device in the surface, then the cable itself, being metallic, would have allowed more of the heat of the surface to make its way down to the sensor. Finally, there is the possibility of a calibration drift of course. If I am not mistaken, these sensors were not built for the purpose that they are now using their data for. They were just going to measure how much of the huge temperature variations of the surface (more than a hundred degrees between day and night) made its way to the subsurface. So regardless of the precision that they may have (which I still find hard to believe that it was of a tenth of a degree, as that kind of precision was not needed for the mission), for sure they didn’t need to have a huge stability record over long periods.
So to get to this ridiculous story of several degrees of surface warming due to a couple of men standing once in the moon, the scientists had to 1) discard possible calibration drifts, 2) discard any other possible reason for the subsurface warming but the change in albedo, and finally, use a model (YES! A MODEL! It’s models all the way down!) of the lunar subsurface to see how much you would need to increase the temperature of the surface to get a 0.3K temperature increase in the subsurface after 3 years. That’s how they arrived to the 1.6-3.5K of lunar surface warming.
If these scientists know the temperature gradient with depth, as they will, then it is quite easy to extrapolate a surface warming from the measurements at depth.
Is such a warming likely? Yes, because a reduction in albedo from (say) 0.25 to 0.15 will cause a substantial increase in insolation absorption during the long Lunar day. And so this result underscores the power of albedo to effect planetary surface temperatures.
Ice age mosulation via dust and albedo.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674987116300305
R
“Is such a warming likely? Yes, because a reduction in albedo from (say) 0.25 to 0.15 will cause a substantial increase in insolation absorption during the long Lunar day. And so this result underscores the power of albedo to effect planetary surface temperatures.”
Re-read that and thing of “SURFACE AREA”. Then try thinking not just puking.
But But But how is this possible as everyone on this site knows we never landed on the moon it was all a fabrication .
It’s just like this global warming thing.
My mate Lew’ told me that is what we believe!
(sarc)
James Bull
Say what?
All of the steps, all of the tracks and landing pad marks and exhaust blast-back… would amount to 0.000000000000000000000001% of the surface area.
Yet “it has to be man’s fault”? This really must be a joke, a little dig at the sceptics from the devout believers?
Please say they weren’t being serious, pleeeeease!
This is a very local warming, caused by the raw power of albedo – it is not a global response to a few scuff marks. The data and explanation are likely correct.
Likewise, it is the albedo of the terrestrial ice caps, that controls the ice age cycle on planet Earth.
Ralph
The moon has an exosphere!
The LADEE Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer, mission to 2014 was designed to address three major science goals:
Determine the global density, composition, and time variability of the tenuous lunar exosphere before it is perturbed by further human activity;
Determine if the Apollo astronaut sightings of diffuse emission at tens of kilometers above the surface were sodium glow or dust;
Document the dust impactor environment (size, frequency) to help guide design engineering for the outpost and also future robotic missions;
On top of that the solar wind migrates stuff to the cold polar craters. He3 is very likely abundant there. Very hard to operate equipment at those temperatures. AFAIK astronauts were warned about staying in shadows.
Probably true.
The sensors are close to the darkened scuff marks. And as I have long suspected, albedo is the strongest temlerature feedback system on the Earth (or Moon). And the lower albedo scuff marks warmed the surface.
R
‘Scientists’ who have never learned the scientific principle, no doubt. However, I am rather more concerned that such valuable data has not been properly archived…