Eli5: How does the core of the Earth (or any planets) not cool and still give off tons of heat energy? Where is this energy coming from?
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There core of the Earth is cooling, but it’s a very very slow process.
The Earth itself is a very good insulator and it keeps a lot of the heat down there, but tectonic movements and volcanoes are constantly removing heat from the Earth’s core. It’s just not that significant compared to how much energy is down there.
The heat of the Earth’s core mostly came from when the Earth was formed, it just takes that long for it to cool down.
The cores of Smaller planets like Mars and the Moon have already cooled down significantly simply because of their smaller size.
Radioactive decay of elements like Uranium also contributes to the ongoing heating of the Earth’s core.
What may make the Earth unique is the Moon. The Moon was formed by a massive impact early in the Earth’s formation. This impact may have re-heated the Earths core and might be why it’s still in a liquid state to this day.
This would be very important for us, because without that we wouldn’t have a magnetic field making life on the surface (outside of the oceans) nearly impossible.
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