As of: March 28, 2024, 3:07 p.m
By: Sofia Popovidi
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Climate change has serious impacts, even on our time. The melting polar ice could play a decisive role here.
Munich – It is no longer a secret that people are changing the planet. The consequences are enormous: environmental disasters, lack of food and water, but also the spread of pathogens. According to the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, around 13 million people die every year due to environmental factors. Now climate change could even have a direct impact on how we measure time. The reason for this is the melting polar ice.
Leap seconds: When climate change changes the way time is measured
As a recently published study in the journal
Nature
shows, melting ice caps are causing the Earth's rotation to slow down. "Enough ice has melted to shift sea levels enough that we can actually see that the Earth's rotation speed has been affected," says Duncan Agnew, a geophysicist and author of the study. The rotation becomes so slow that the time measurement can also change.
Global warming not only affects the climate, but also the measurement of time. Researchers warn about the possible effects. (Symbol image/archive image) © imagebroker/imago
The rotation of the earth determines the hours and minutes that determine our day. Specifically, the so-called leap seconds are about to change - a mechanism that has been used since 1972 to align official atomic clocks with the time based on the Earth's rotation speed.
The problem with the Earth's rotation and leap seconds: The rotation is not constant and the Earth is not a rigid ball. Depending on what is happening on the earth's surface, it can change again and again. This change, which is imperceptible to humans, means that the world clocks occasionally have to be adjusted by a leap second to bring them back into harmony. After a few seconds had to be added over the years, now for the first time a second has to be subtracted. That has consequences.
What is Coordinated Universal Time?
Universal Time, also known as Coordinated Universal Time or
UTC
, is a uniform time reference used worldwide. Universal time is based on a fixed point: the prime meridian, which runs through Greenwich, London. At this point it is 0:00 UTC. The time is then calculated around the world based on this reference. World Time is also used by computers, navigation systems and other technologies to ensure that everyone stays in sync.
Why is that important?
Because there is a consistent time for everyone, regardless of where you are in the world. This makes communication and coordination between different countries and time zones easier. For example, if two people in different countries talk to each other and want to make an appointment, they can easily agree on universal time without having to worry about different time zones.
“Pretty amazing”: Global warming affects timekeeping – researchers warn of consequences
Researchers in particular express concerns about the lack of leap seconds. As
CNN World
reports, this change could have devastating effects on the world's computer systems. “To me, the fact that humans have caused a change in the rotation of the Earth is pretty amazing. Many computer systems have software that allows them to add a second, but few are capable of subtracting one. “Humans have to reprogram the computers, which creates the risk of errors,” said Agnew. According to the geophysicist, no one expected that the Earth would accelerate so much that a leap second would have to be removed.
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Seen in this way, the slower rotation of the Earth due to climate change is good news in at least one respect: it postpones the insertion of the - probably negative - leap second by three years, from 2026 to 2029. However, Agnew hopes that the influence of climate change on time measurement will have some effect will move people to action.
A new study from Cambridge shows that a large amount of ice has melted in the Arctic since the end of the last ice age. Ice drilling has shown this.
(spo)