Vast amounts of solar energy radiate to the Earth, but tapping it

The sunlight that reaches Earth every day dwarfs all the planet''s other energy sources. This solar energy is clearly sufficient in scale to meet all of mankind''s energy needs

Can energy harnessed from Earth''s interior help

Pulling energy from the Earth a huge meteorite hit Earth. Scientists may have just found where. And studying a reservoir to see if it has the right temperature and pressure to produce

The Sun''s Energy: An Essential Part of the Earth System

It takes solar energy an average of 8 ⅓ minutes to reach Earth from the Sun. This energy travels about 150 million kilometers (93 million miles) through space to reach the top of Earth''s

Here''s What Would Happen If Apophis Hit Earth

If those figures are meaningless to you, here''s a real-world example of what it all means: The asteroid that created Arizona''s Meteor Crater (seen above) is believed to have exploded with the force between three and 10

Impact event

OverviewImpacts and the EarthElsewhere in the Solar SystemExtrasolar impactsSee alsoFurther readingExternal links

An impact event is a collision between astronomical objects causing measurable effects. Impact events have been found to regularly occur in planetary systems, though the most frequent involve asteroids, comets or meteoroids and have minimal effect. When large objects impact terrestrial planets such as the Earth, there can be significant physical and biospheric consequences, as the impacti

StarChild: Meteoroids

If the meteor does not burn up completely, the remaining portion hits the Earth and is then called a meteorite. Over 100 meteorites hit the Earth each year. Fortunately, most of them are very small. There has only been one report of a

Meteors, Meteorites and Impacts

Meteorites are bits of the solar system that have fallen to the Earth. Most come from asteroids, including few are believed to have come specifically from 4 Vesta; a few probably come from comets. A small number of

Can Meteorite Impacts Disturb a Planet''s Magnetic

When a meteorite hits the Earth, it creates intense heat and pressure that can melt the shocked region. As the melt slowly solidifies, magnetic minerals in the newly created rock record the...

Meteorite strike in South Africa: scientists offer clues about what it

Meteorites are pieces of our solar system which fall to Earth, where they can be studied without having to send expensive probes up into space to examine them at the source.

What we would actually do to stop a ''doomsday''

A Didymos-size rock hitting the Earth about 15.5 kilometres per second – about the minimum speed it would be travelling at – would release something like two megatons worth of energy; easily

Pieces of the Sky (Meteorites)

More than 85 percent of meteorites that fall to Earth are stony. They originate in asteroids with mantles and crusts, and contain minerals similar to those in Earth rocks. Some meteorites formed when rock inside their parent asteroids melted

Meteors and Meteorites

Scientists estimate that about 48.5 tons (44 tonnes or 44,000 kilograms) of meteoritic material falls on Earth each day. Almost all the material is vaporized in Earth''s atmosphere, leaving a bright trail fondly called "shooting stars." Several

Ancient meteorite impact sparked long-lived volcanic eruptions on Earth

The ''bolide'' hit Earth here 1.85 billion years ago and excavated a deep basin, which was filled with melted target rocks and, later, with jumbled mixed rocks full of tiny