๐โs core is made of magma/lava right? Where does all the energy comes from and how come itโs still in liquid state after millions of years.
In: Earth Science
The core is solid iron/nickel, but the area between that and the crust is molten. The planet started off very hot, and like a giant hydroflask it takes a while for all that energy to leak out. Additionally, while there isn’t a lot of radioactive stuff down there, the planet is sufficiently well insulated that radiation keeps it warm.
The heat is partly left over from the formation of the Earth. The other part comes from the decay of radioactive material throughout the entire planet.
This isn’t actually a huge amount of energy by itself, but the mantle and core are surrounded by a miles-thick blanket of rock that you’re currently sitting on. So it loses heat very very slowly because it’s very well-insulated: the amount of heat lost from the interior of the Earth is actually not much bigger than the amount of energy humans are currently using, meaning that humans are contributing almost as much to the Earth’s *surface* temperature through raw energy usage as the slow drain of heat from the core is.
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