<p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-021-01487-w" rel="nofollow noreferrer" title="Solar wind contributions to Earth’s oceans">About 30,000 tonnes</a> of extraterrestrial material arrives on earth every year, mostly in the form of submillimeter dust. Unfortunately, these <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micrometeorite" rel="nofollow noreferrer">micrometeorites</a> are pretty dry.  The wettest meteors <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-021-01487-w" rel="nofollow noreferrer" title="Solar wind contributions to Earth’s oceans">might be 10% water</a> by weight, but a <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=lDbMELpF8EcC&amp;pg=PA78" rel="nofollow noreferrer" title="Comets and the Origin and Evolution of Life">generous estimate</a> of the average amount of water in micrometeorites would be 4%, so the earth is probably not receiving more than about a 1000 tonnes of water per year, and likely less.</p>
<p>The earth loses about <a href="https://earthscience.stackexchange.com/questions/9488/how-much-water-is-the-atmosphere-losing-to-space" title="How much water is the atmosphere losing to space?">10,000 tonnes of water annually</a>, far more than it receives from space.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-11-14T14:31:42.087Z
Thank you very much for your answer, now I can subtract the amount of water the Earth is losing by the amount its earning meaning it probably loses about 9000 Tonnes each year, Thank you.
Tardy
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-11-12T17:16:42.710Z
2022-11-12T17:16:42.710Z
David Bailey
<p>I was reading this <a href="https://earthscience.stackexchange.com/questions/9488/how-much-water-is-the-atmosphere-losing-to-space">Question</a> earlier about how if water is getting lost into space and one of the answers said that (paraphrase) the Earth lost about enough water for the oceans to reduce by 12 cm, if the Earth lost that amount of water, could it make up for the loss by receiving Water from Space? I did research about this
<a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=how%20did%20earth%20get%20its%20water&amp;rlz=1CASFJY_enUS1020&amp;oq=how%20did%20Earth%20get%20its%20water&amp;aqs=chrome.0.0i512l2j0i390.6038j0j7&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;ie=UTF-8&amp;safe=active&amp;ssui=on" rel="noreferrer">Source</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Far from the Sun, where temperatures are low, water formed icy objects such as comets, while closer to the Sun water reacted with rocky materials to form hydrated minerals. It's thought that the mostly likely way that planet Earth inherited its water was from asteroids and comets crashing into it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Is the Earth still receiving Water this way?</p>

<atmosphere><hydrology><water><water-vapour>
How much water is the atmosphere receiving
Tardy
# How much water is the atmosphere receiving

(Asked by: username_0 on 2022-08-29)

I was reading this [Question](https://earthscience.stackexchange.com/questions/9488/how-much-water-is-the-atmosphere-losing-to-space) earlier about how if water is getting lost into space and one of the answers said that (paraphrase) the Earth lost about enough water for the oceans to reduce by 12 cm, if the Earth lost that amount of water, could it make up for the loss by receiving Water from Space? I did research about this
[Source](https://www.google.com/search?q=how%20did%20earth%20get%20its%20water&rlz=1CASFJY_enUS1020&oq=how%20did%20Earth%20get%20its%20water&aqs=chrome.0.0i512l2j0i390.6038j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&safe=active&ssui=on)

> Far from the Sun, where temperatures are low, water formed icy objects such as comets, while closer to the Sun water reacted with rocky materials to form hydrated minerals. It's thought that the mostly likely way that planet Earth inherited its water was from asteroids and comets crashing into it.

Is the Earth still receiving Water this way?

**Tags:** atmosphere, hydrology, water, water-vapour


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2022-11-12. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

[About 30,000 tonnes](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-021-01487-w "Solar wind contributions to Earth’s oceans") of extraterrestrial material arrives on earth every year, mostly in the form of submillimeter dust. Unfortunately, these [micrometeorites](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micrometeorite) are pretty dry. The wettest meteors [might be 10% water](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-021-01487-w "Solar wind contributions to Earth’s oceans") by weight, but a [generous estimate](https://books.google.ca/books?id=lDbMELpF8EcC&pg=PA78 "Comets and the Origin and Evolution of Life") of the average amount of water in micrometeorites would be 4%, so the earth is probably not receiving more than about a 1000 tonnes of water per year, and likely less.

The earth loses about [10,000 tonnes of water annually](https://earthscience.stackexchange.com/questions/9488/how-much-water-is-the-atmosphere-losing-to-space "How much water is the atmosphere losing to space?"), far more than it receives from space.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thank you very much for your answer, now I can subtract the amount of water the Earth is losing by the amount its earning meaning it probably loses about 9000 Tonnes each year, Thank you.  

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