• Question: how old can water be? what was the age of the oldest water you found?

    Asked by to Ben, Emily, Hattie, Jemma on 25 Jun 2014. This question was also asked by .
    • Photo: Emily Hayward

      Emily Hayward answered on 25 Jun 2014:

      Great question Cutewikib!

      Water is as old as the earth – so very old (millions/billions of years)! Some scientists have tried to determine the age of water by the weight of the hydrogen atoms in it, but this is pretty hard, especially as lots of water molecules are broken down to make hydrogen as a fuel, and then when they burn they make water again, so its kinda a bit of a continuius cycle where water is broken up and reformed…..does this make the water old or new?! If it was once water, and then stpped being water, and then became water again. Aging things like this is more difficult than aging a human or a dog.

      In my work it doesnt matter how old the water is, but I generally think all of the water is millions of years old, even if its changed form, and then back to water again.

      Great question, and I hope this answers it. If you want more details please comment 🙂

    • Photo: Jemma Rowlandson

      Jemma Rowlandson answered on 25 Jun 2014:

      Hi!

      Water is as old as the Earth itself, which makes it over 4 billion years old! When the Earth was forming is was just a molten bit of rock, so hot that any water would have evaporated. As it cooled meteorites and asteroids, made up of rock, dust and ice hit the Earth. The ice from millions of these meteorites and asteroids is the water on Earth today.

      The Earth has a water cycle so no water is lost. The Sun evaporates water, turning it into clouds which are then rained out again. This means we are drinking the same water as the dinosaurs! This also means it’s the same water that came from all those meteorites and comets 4 billion years ago.

      You can get water which has been out of this cycle, by being trapped in rocks deep within underground caves. The oldest water ever found like this was 2.6 billion years old! This water is especially awesome as it can tell us what was going in oceans over 2 billion years ago. The scientist that found it actually tasted the water, apparently it was very salty!

    • Photo: Ben Butler

      Ben Butler answered on 25 Jun 2014:

      I haven’t got much to else to add than what Emily and Jemma have said… water is pretty old! It’s pretty much the ultimate recycled material!

      The water you drink has already been drunk by countless other animals and people. It’s then passed back into the water cycle to rivers and the sea where it is evaporated and rains back down on us eventually.

      Just think, you might be drinking some of the same water that Albert Einstein or David Beckham has!

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