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Warming-driven changes in atmospheric circulation can increase the atmosphere’s angular momentum and, through an exchange with the solid Earth, slightly lengthen the day. A 2026 study projects this atmospheric contribution under a high-emissions climate scenario; it does not show that climate change is the sole or dominant cause of changes in Earth’s rotation.

How the atmosphere can change the length of a day

Earth’s rotation is not perfectly constant. The atmosphere carries angular momentum around the planet’s rotation axis through both moving air and the distribution of atmospheric mass. When atmospheric angular momentum (AAM) changes, the solid Earth’s rotation changes in the opposite direction in the study’s accounting. An increase in AAM therefore corresponds to a slightly slower solid Earth rotation and a longer length of day (LOD).

LOD is the duration of a full rotation, expressed relative to the conventional 24-hour day. The change discussed here is tiny: the study reports it in milliseconds, not minutes or hours. It is a geophysical signal, not a perceptible change to an individual day.

What the 2026 study projected

Satpathy and coauthors’ study, published in npj Climate and Atmospheric Science on 20 March 2026, with the journal listing the version of record as 22 April 2026, examined large-ensemble climate simulations under SSP3-7.0. That is a high-emissions scenario, so the results are conditional projections rather than a forecast that applies to every emissions pathway. The authors compared simulations through 2100 with an 1850–2014 baseline and used ensemble means to help distinguish externally forced changes from internal climate variability. Read the study.

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The analysis used 100 CESM2-LE members, 40 ACCESS-ESM-1.5 members, and 50 MIROC6 members. AAM was derived from atmospheric motion, represented by zonal winds, and atmospheric mass distribution, represented by surface pressure. The authors found increases in both components, with the motion component making the larger contribution.

Estimated sensitivity in each model

The paper reports these ensemble-mean estimates of AAM-driven LOD sensitivity. They are model results published by Satpathy and coauthors in 2026, not universal constants or direct measurements of the effect of each degree of observed warming.

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Climate-model ensemble Estimated LOD sensitivity
CESM2-LE 0.0901 milliseconds per degree Celsius
ACCESS-ESM-1.5 0.1113 milliseconds per degree Celsius
MIROC6 0.1119 milliseconds per degree Celsius

Which circulation changes are involved?

The projected rise in motion-related AAM is associated with changes in large-scale circulation as the climate warms:

  • The Hadley cell, a tropical circulation pattern, expands poleward.
  • Subtropical jets strengthen, and upper-tropospheric westerlies intensify.
  • Tropical easterlies weaken.

The mass-related AAM contribution is smaller. The study associates it with stronger subtropical high-pressure systems around 30 degrees north and south. Its companion explanation also discusses reduced momentum exchange through changes in mountain and friction torques. Torque diagnostics are only approximate confirmation, however: climate models do not fully represent subgrid-scale momentum exchange, so the torque budget does not close exactly.

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What the 10–18% comparison means

For 2050–2099, the study projects an AAM-driven LOD contribution equivalent to an additional 10–18% of the lunar tidal-friction trend across its three models. This comparison provides a sense of scale for one projected atmospheric influence. It does not mean that climate change accounts for 10–18% of every change in day length, or that lunar tidal friction dominates rotation variability on every timescale. The authors note that the atmospheric contribution depends on the emissions scenario and could be larger under higher-emissions pathways. The author’s companion explanation describes the comparison.

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What this result does—and does not—establish

This is a model-based projection of the atmospheric AAM contribution under SSP3-7.0, not an observational attribution showing that warming caused a measured day-length trend. Individual ensemble members retain substantial variability; the study uses the ensemble-mean trend to estimate the externally forced signal.

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The analysis isolates atmospheric AAM from other influences, including ice-sheet melting, terrestrial water storage, and other barystatic mass changes. Earth’s rotation also responds to lunar tides, mass redistribution, and exchanges involving the core and mantle. These influences operate across different timescales, and the paper expects core–mantle processes to remain a dominant driver of future rotational variability. A 2021 review discusses links between lunar recession and length of day.

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