– Space is a vacuum with zero atmosphere, so heat does not transfer well. Could we get really close to the sun because of that?

Question

– Space is a vacuum with zero atmosphere, so heat does not transfer well. Could we get really close to the sun because of that?

In: 4

Answer 1

There are two factors less: conduction and convection.

What you are left with is: radiation.

Your temperature is the result of what you take vs what you give away, in terms of heat.

Radiation loses strength at the square of the distance, every time you halve your distance form the sun you get four times more heat radiated onto you. Then you have to lose that heat be radiating it from you to the cosmos.

You radiate heat proportionally to your temperature difference from the outer things, let’s just assume space around you is zero kelvin in every direction to make this easy.

Let’s say, there’s a perfect distance from the sun where you get 300Kelvin degrees hot, that means 27 Celsius, quite livable.

If you cut your distance from the sun in halve you absorb four times more heat,you need to get 4 times hotter in kelvin to lose that heat and stabilize your temperature. This means you stop heating up at 1200 kelvin which is 927 Celsius which is less livable for humans.

This dumbed down a lot and not considering the full formula. The true temperature would be different from what I say for sure, but roughly, this shows you become an over cooked steak very quickly. The missing part do the formula is your color, how much you reflect of the heat, and other factors that basically are the thing we play with to shield spacecrafts from heat loss or heat takes.