Scientists Find Climate Change Slows Earth Rotation

SEAToday.com, Jakarta - A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) on Monday (7/15) reveals that climate change is gradually lengthening our days.

As global temperatures rise, glaciers and ice sheets are melting, causing water to redistribute from the poles towards the equator. This shift in mass is altering the Earth’s shape, making it more of an oval, which in turn slows down its rotation.

The NASA-funded studies refer to this phenomenon as polar motion, where the Earth's axis slightly shifts due to these mass changes.

While this has been occurring since 1900, the rate of change has accelerated since 2000, with days lengthening by about 1.33 milliseconds per century. Study co-author Surendra Adhikari emphasizes that climate change, whether human-induced or naturally occurring, is a primary driver of these rotational changes. If greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase, the study predicts that days could lengthen by as much as 2.62 milliseconds per century.