Mass of Earth\'s Atmosphere There are no new skills required to answer questions
ID: 283189 • Letter: M
Question
Mass of Earth's Atmosphere There are no new skills required to answer questions like this (and lb) beyond what we discussed in class at the beginning of the semester: basic manipulation of quantities and their units. Earth's surface pressure is approximately 1 kg per square centimeter. What is Earth's surface pressure in kilograms per square kilometer? (Appendices C.3 and C.4 might be helpful for this) What is Earth's surface area, in square kilometers, assuming Earth's radius is 6400 km (and using the fact that surface area is given by 4 times pi times (Radius)^2? Using your answers for (a) and (b), what is the total mass of Earth's entire atmosphere, in kilograms? (look at the units!) What fraction (or percentage, if you prefer) of Earth's total mass does its atmosphere account for? (Use Appendix E for Earth's mass) The Earth's oceans are estimated to have a mass of about 1.4 times 10^21 kg. How many times more massive are the Earth's oceans than the Earth's atmosphere?Explanation / Answer
a). 1kg per square centimeter is equal to 10,000 kg per square meter.
b). 51478540.346 square kilometer simply 5.1* 10^ 8 km2
e). Earth's ocean mass = 1.4*10^21 kg
Earth's atmospheric mass = 5.1 4* 10^18 kg