Explained: Why Do We Need Sunlight?

Hello young learners, 

Welcome to another episode of Kiki’s Knowledge Corner. Since you value the information I share with you all, here is another interesting topic that will boggle your mind.

Like you lovelies, I enjoy the bright and sunny mornings too. So I want to talk about the sun today! When it comes to the big ball of fire that lights up the earth, there is a wealth of information that I can share. Would you like to know why we need sunlight? Have you ever wondered what would happen if the sun suddenly disappeared? Let’s start exploring this interesting topic!

Why is the sun hot?

As you may have learnt in school, the sun is a big ball of fire that is really far away from us. 

Gases like hydrogen and helium burn at a really high temperature through a nuclear reaction. This makes the sun extremely hot – over a million degrees!

When the nuclear reaction happens, the sun releases energy in the form of radiation. These radiations hit all the planets in the solar system and cause a lot of chemical reactions.

On earth, these reactions support the life of all living things. Let’s understand how!

Source of life

Our earth requires light and heat that is provided by the sun. Living things need solar energy to exist. So without the sun, there wouldn’t be any plants, animals or people. 

Besides, the sun also controls the water cycle: evaporation → cloud formation → precipitation, giving us one of the essentials – water. It also shapes weather on earth by heating the earth’s surface to varying degrees. Without all these happening, life would not sustain. 

Without the sun there would be no vegetation on earth because you know that plants need light to live and grow. It even enables plants to produce oxygen through photosynthesis, which humans and animals need to breathe.

Source of light

Without sunlight, it would be completely dark on earth. Once sunlight hits the earth’s atmosphere, it scatters and lights up the earth making it daytime. 

Source of Warmth

The sun’s radiations give us the amount of warmth needed for humans, animals and plants to live. Without the sun’s radiation, no life could survive. Most of the earth’s surface would turn icy cold within weeks and have no means to support life because we need a certain amount of warmth to survive.

Source of adequate water

The warm rays of the sun evaporate the water from the earth’s surface, including the ocean. That’s why the sea level stays balanced and doesn’t overflow, ensuring that we do not get fully flooded. Without the sun, we may live underwater, as the earth may have been flooded long ago. 

The sun also brings in the rain, as we all know. The evaporated ocean water settles in the clouds. If a cloud becomes too heavy or hits a mountain, the water falls as rain on the ground filling up the seas, rivers and lakes again. 

Some rainwater seeps into the groundwater and becomes a source of drinking water for us. Imagine having water without sunlight! Now that you know why we need sunlight and what would happen to the earth without it, do you know how other planets are affected by the sun?

Let us know what other subjects we can explore together!