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00:00 In everyday life, we perhaps spend more time feeling frustrated by the wind for how it
00:04 affects us than we do appreciating how important it is.
00:07 Really, the wind is immensely powerful, integral to human life and culture, and a phenomenon
00:12 that likely exists on every planet with an atmosphere.
00:16 But what would life be like without this immutable force of nature?
00:19 This is Unveiled, and today we're answering the extraordinary question; what would happen
00:23 if there was no wind on Earth?
00:28 Do you need the big questions answered?
00:30 Are you constantly curious?
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00:38 The wind is a little strange when you sit back and think about it.
00:41 It's completely invisible but can be extremely strong, a major cause of fatalities and natural
00:45 disasters, and it's created by simple mechanisms in the atmosphere.
00:49 Earth's atmosphere is heated unevenly because of how it tilts on its own axis, with one
00:54 hemisphere always leaning nearer to the sun.
00:57 This heating creates air pressure differences, with different air pressures leading to very
01:01 different weather effects.
01:02 Hurricanes, for instance, are caused by low air pressure, while high-pressure weather
01:07 systems are usually cloudless and comfortable.
01:10 Cloudless conditions bring cold weather in winter and hot weather in summer.
01:13 Wind is so powerful that it's often a major part of myths, legends and fables.
01:18 In Greek mythology, Zeus, the god of the sky and thunder, is also the king of the Olympians,
01:23 a testament to the raw power of storms and cyclones.
01:27 Maybe Zeus would never have existed, or some other god would be the leader of the Greek
01:30 pantheon otherwise.
01:32 Poseidon, maybe, since earthquakes and tidal waves would still happen without the wind.
01:37 Nevertheless, while the wind can bring life and death, we really do need it to survive.
01:42 That said, one benefit of a windless, alternate world would be a stop to severe storms.
01:47 There wouldn't be any hurricanes anymore without winds.
01:50 And if you live in an area prone to tropical cyclones, the thought of never having to deal
01:55 with another one and the tragedies they bring might make the loss of wind seem worthwhile.
02:00 No wind would also have an impact on wildfires.
02:03 Fires would still happen, but less frequently, because without strong gusts, we wouldn't
02:07 have thunderstorms, and the main natural cause of wildfires, lightning strikes, wouldn't
02:13 occur.
02:14 Even if a fire did break out, without strong winds to spread and make that fire worse,
02:18 it would be much easier to contain and put out.
02:20 The Santa Ana winds, for instance, in California are today a major contributor to California's
02:26 notorious annual wildfires.
02:28 Without them, the fires wouldn't be so severe.
02:30 On a slightly less life-threatening note, without wind, you'd also never need to contend
02:35 with the daily dangers and irritations they can bring.
02:38 For example, a wind-free existence could make living with certain allergies, like hay fever,
02:43 far easier, because the wind wouldn't be blowing all of the pollen around.
02:47 With all that in mind, however, the flip side is far, far worse.
02:51 The consequences for wind ceasing to exist - or never having existed in the first place
02:55 - are apocalyptic, to say the least.
02:58 Tropical storms and wildfires are bad, certainly, but they're also vital parts of the ecosystem
03:03 that occur naturally.
03:04 And it's not just massive, life-threatening storms that we wouldn't have without the
03:08 wind; it's pretty much any storms at all.
03:11 Without wind to circulate evaporated water, the water cycle itself would be interrupted,
03:16 perhaps terminally.
03:17 When water evaporates, it rises, condenses into clouds, and then falls back to Earth
03:22 as rain.
03:23 Though there are other mechanisms that move clouds through the sky, our winds are a major
03:27 part of it.
03:28 Without them, water would still evaporate, but only to fall back down as rain in exactly
03:33 the same location, rather than spreading around the globe.
03:36 This is then very bad news for anybody who doesn't live immediately next to a large
03:40 body of water, and it might be disruptive enough that rivers and streams (unless they're
03:45 particularly large) would dry up completely.
03:48 Everything inland would end up barren, with crops failing and human and animal populations
03:53 forced to move to the coast or to around large lakes.
03:56 Admittedly, human civilization is already built around large bodies of water, thanks
04:01 to trade routes and plain common sense.
04:03 But with modern technology, some cities are built great distances away from the sea.
04:08 Without the winds to guide the water cycle, though, our water supply could be interrupted,
04:12 which would have immediate and deadly consequences.
04:15 Rain cities would certainly fail.
04:17 Meanwhile, if you do live near a major lake or ocean, then you're actually going to
04:21 get more rain than usual, since the clouds above are never going to be blown anywhere
04:25 else.
04:26 Living in a constantly wet and humid environment is far better than suffering because of a
04:30 lack of water, but still not ideal.
04:33 In general, then, without wind, Earth would be transformed into a world of stark contrasts
04:37 - wetlands and deserts with little in between.
04:41 A lack of wind would affect the temperature, too.
04:43 Wind is caused by temperature differences in Earth's atmosphere, yes, but it also
04:47 carries those temperatures around.
04:49 That's why cold snaps can be caused by cold air blowing in from somewhere else.
04:53 Temperatures would stagnate very quickly in this windless time, meaning that only the
04:57 rotation of Earth and the sun would affect our temperature.
05:00 We would then have much less varied weather.
05:02 And without the movement of air, parts of Earth would get permanently more extreme.
05:06 The poles would freeze over completely, losing more liquid water for us - although potentially
05:11 averting further climate change, as well.
05:13 Then again, down at the equator, temperatures would become so high without the winds to
05:18 limit them that it would be practically impossible to live there.
05:21 People would flock to those milder areas of the northern and southern hemispheres to survive…
05:25 although with the sudden lack of reliable food and water sources due to the lack of
05:29 wind, survival would be far from guaranteed.
05:32 This particular scenario would also mean that everything in the world that's powered by
05:36 wind would stop working.
05:38 Currently, about six percent of global electricity comes from the wind, though some countries
05:42 rely on it more than others.
05:44 The exceptionally windy United Kingdom, for example, produces nearly a quarter of its
05:48 energy in this way.
05:49 So, this lack of power is sure to make an impact worldwide.
05:53 There would be blackouts and electricity shortages, with no way to easily make up the difference.
05:58 We'd still have solar power, at least… but hydroelectric power sources could suffer,
06:03 too, as water from rivers dries up and the dams quickly empty.
06:07 Short of world-changing levels of investment in solar, we'd have to resort to nuclear
06:11 energy and back to fossil fuels… but short- and long-term effects could be catastrophic.
06:16 But just how likely is something like this to actually happen?
06:19 Thankfully, it's just about impossible.
06:22 If you're living on a planet or celestial body with any kind of gaseous atmosphere at
06:27 all, you're going to have wind.
06:29 This means that for Earth to suddenly not have wind, or even to never have had wind
06:33 at all, it would also need to have no atmosphere whatsoever.
06:37 And suffice it to say, if Earth didn't have an atmosphere, then the lack of wind would
06:41 be the last thing we'd need to worry about… because we'd have no air to breathe and
06:45 nothing to protect us from the full heat of the sun.
06:48 Ultimately, this is a situation that can be taken even further still, because another
06:52 thing that fuels the atmosphere and the movement of the wind in general is the rotation of
06:56 the planet itself.
06:57 So, would a truly wind-free Earth also be an entirely still world, suspended in space?
07:03 If so, we might also imagine that while not rotating around on its own axis, Earth might
07:08 also not continue travelling around the sun.
07:11 If it somehow just stayed put, this would mean one side of it would be immensely hot
07:15 while the other is unfathomably cold.
07:18 But it wouldn't just stay put.
07:20 Instead, without rotation, it would more simply just fall into the sun at the centre of the
07:24 solar system.
07:26 Again, this would be something else far more worrisome than the initial fact that we'd
07:30 also have stopped having wind.
07:32 The good news, then, is that there's really not any mechanism by which something like
07:35 this is possible.
07:37 Absolutely everything in outer space is moving all the time, and if Earth stopped doing that,
07:41 then it will have defied the laws of physics.
07:43 If Earth didn't have wind but did still have an atmosphere, then there's really
07:47 no scientific process that could allow for that.
07:50 So, what do you think?
07:51 Would you rather take the few pros of not having any wind over the massive downsides?
07:56 Could you imagine life without wind, really?
07:58 Let us know in the comments.
07:59 For now (and, actually, forever), while it can be inconvenient (and even highly dangerous
08:04 at times), it is an integral part of what makes this place a habitable planet capable
08:09 of supporting so much diverse life.
08:12 But that's what would happen if there was no wind on Earth.
08:15 What do you think?
08:16 Is there anything we missed?
08:17 Let us know in the comments, check out these other clips from Unveiled, and make sure you
08:21 subscribe and ring the bell for our latest content.