News Headline

Clues Found That Earth May Have a Thermostat Set to “Habitable”

Source
EOS

Publication Date
2017-09-05

n 1981 geologists proposed that the chemical weathering of rocks like granite can draw the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) out of the atmosphere and, in the process, cool Earth. As cooling progressed, chemical weathering reaction rates would decrease, more CO2 would remain in the air, and warming of the planet would begin again. Although this sort of natural “thermostat” could help explain such puzzles as why CO2 from volcanic eruptions does not accumulate in the atmosphere unceasingly, physical evidence for a mechanism that moderates the planet’s temperature has been lacking.

Content
https://eos.org/articles/clues-found-that-earth-may-have-a-thermostat-set-to-habitable