Research paper

Ronald Aguz

Global climate change is not a future problem. Changes to

Earth’s climate driven by increased human emissions of
heat-trapping greenhouse gases are already having
widespread effects on the environment: glaciers and ice
sheets are shrinking, river and lake ice is breaking up
earlier, plant and animal geographic ranges are shifting,
and plants and trees are blooming sooner.

heat that is generated within the Earth. (Geo means “earth,”

and thermal means “heat” in Greek.) It is a renewable resource that
can be harvested for human use.

About 2,900 kilometers (1,800 miles) below the Earth’s crust, or

surface, is the hottest part of our planet: the core. A small portion of
the core’s heat comes from the friction and gravitational pull formed
when Earth was created more than 4 billion years ago. However, the
vast majority of Earth’s heat is constantly generated by the decay
of radioactive isotopes, such as potassium-40 and thorium-232.

Isotopes are forms of an element that have a different number

of neutrons than regular versions of the element’s atom.

Potassium, for instance, has 20 neutrons in its nucleus. Potassium-40,

however, has 21 neutrons. As potassium-40 decays, its nucleus
changes, emitting enormous amounts of energy (radiation).
Potassium-40 most often decays to isotopes of calcium (calcium-40)
and argon (argon-40).

Radioactive decay is a continual process in the core. Temperatures

there rise to more than 5,000° Celsius (about 9,000° Fahrenheit). Heat
from the core is constantly radiating outward and warming rocks,
water, gas, and other geological material.

Earth’s temperature rises with depth from the surface to the core. This
gradual change in temperature is known as the geothermal gradient.
In most parts of the world, the geothermal gradient is about 25° C per
1 kilometer of depth (1° F per 77 feet of depth).