Global Warming to the Extreme!
Taking into account the effect of the drag caused by the outer atmosphere of the dying sun, University of Sussex (UK) astronomers now predict that the earth will be swallowed up by the sun in about 7.6 billion years unless the earth's orbit can be altered. Now I'm scared!
But don't worry, life will have already disappeared long before that 7.6 billion years as the earth will be a very hot, dry and uninhabitable ball in about a billion years, according to Dr. Robert Smith, Emeritus Reader of Astronomy.
What can be done? A team from Sant Cruz University suggest harnessing the gravitational effects of a close passage by a large asteroid to "nudge" the earth's orbit gradually outwards away from the encroaching sun.
"This sounds like science fiction," says Professor Smith. "But it seems that the energy requirements are just about possible and the technology could be developed over the next few centuries." However, it is a high-risk strategy - a slight miscalculation, and the asteroid could actually hit the Earth, with catastrophic consequences. "A safer solution may be to build a fleet of interplanetary 'life rafts' that could manoeuvre themselves always out of reach of the Sun, but close enough to use its energy," he adds in the press release from the University.
