The melting ice is already affecting the Earth’s rotation and, consequently, the clocks. Over the past 50 years, all the time discontinuities have led to time being added to clocks. But due to the rapid rate of melting of the ice caps in Greenland and Antarctica, the planet is slowing down.
A study, published in the scientific journal Nature this Wednesday, suggests that, from 2026 and because the Earth is rotating more slowly, we can start taking seconds away, instead of adding them. And that climate change is responsible for delaying the problem by three years.
The warning is left by researcher Duncan Agnew, geophysicist at the Institute of Planetary Physics at the University of California San Diego, who explains that, as the ice melts at the poles, the concentration of the Earth’s mass changes and that this influences the angular velocity of the Earth. planet. And he compares the phenomenon to the dynamics of an ice skater.
“If a skater starts to spin, if they lower their arms and raise their legs, that will cause them to slow down,” he said. On the other hand, if the skater closes her limbs, she will spin faster.
Thus, a lower concentration of ice in Greenland and Antarctica will cause more of the planet’s mass to be concentrated at the Equator – the Earth’s waist.
The study points out that human influence is changing the planet’s rotation speed, something that Agnew considers “impressive”.
Between 1972 and 1999, one second was added annually to UTC (Coordinated Universal Time) – 27 seconds in total. However, this has only happened four times since the beginning of the millennium and the study shows that from 2026 we can start removing seconds, instead of adding them. In a more optimistic scenario, there will be no subtraction or addition of seconds until 2040.
The most likely scenario, taking into account the Earth’s rotation, is that a second will be removed in the year 2029, something that has been delayed for three years due to climate change and the planet’s mass transfer.
