Earth with Rings

[tomBitonti]

Re: The shadow contrast, images in astronomy are rarely what the eye would see.

E.g.:

http://news.softpedia.com/newsImage/Darkness-Falls-Over-Saturn-s-Rings-2.jpg/

But also:

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl...uDUcO4OJSs4AOC3oCYDg&ved=0CEEQ9QEwBA&dur=1789

Now, this is interesting ... except that it is from 1919!

http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu//full/1919ApJ....50....1B/0000001.000.html

Lets see if there is anything more recent ...

Well, this is a bit too much to work through, but is closer to being useful:

http://www.igpp.ucla.edu/public/mki...NS/Flandes Sat rings vs Solar elevtn 2010.pdf

This at last shows albedos:

http://www.iki.rssi.ru/solar/eng/saturn.htm

That gives:

C 0.25
Maxwell Gap
B 0.65
Cassini 0.30
A 0.60

Thx!

TomB

 

[sabrinathecat]

We already have rings ... of space junk.

And there's a plan to put another satellite in orbit that would vacuum up the odd debris and push non-repairable satellites into faster decaying orbits to burn up in atmosphere as an attempt to clean up our neighborhood.

 

[tomBitonti]

So ... with albedo's in the 0.25 to 0.65 range, won't the rings be intensely bright?

http://www.asterism.org/tutorials/tut26-1.htm

And:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albedo

Which has:

Surface Typical albedo
Fresh asphalt 0.04
Worn asphalt 0.12
Conifer forest (Summer) 0.08,[3] 0.09 to 0.15
Deciduous trees 0.15 to 0.18
Bare soil 0.17
Green grass 0.25
Desert sand 0.40
New concrete 0.55
Ocean ice 0.5–0.7
Fresh snow 0.80–0.90

But, that doesn't account for the angle of viewing, which will affect the value.

(The moons albedo is 0.12, plus or minus angle adjustments.)

Given the huge size of the rings, wouldn't there be significant effects to climate and habitat due to the large amounts of reflected light, as well as shadows?

Thx!

TomB

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

And there's a plan to put another satellite in orbit that would vacuum up the odd debris and push non-repairable satellites into faster decaying orbits to burn up in atmosphere as an attempt to clean up our neighborhood.

Good. It will leave us with nice, tidy, predictable rings of space junk.