What would happen if there was no wind?

If all the winds would stop, we would quickly notice, in addition to the absence of wind waves, that there would be no more waves in the lakes and seas.

In this case, the water would no longer mix, so that oxygen would not move from the surface to deeper water, and nutrients would not move from the bottom to the surface water. The number of fish and other life in the seas and lakes would clearly decrease.

Some plants rely on the wind to carry their pollen, such as pine, birch, common pine and timothy. If there was no wind, those plants would no longer be able to continue their lives.

The wind also transports heat from the sunny equatorial region towards the Earth’s poles, where the Sun warms less.

If there was no wind, for example Finland would be extremely cold in winter and extremely hot at the equator. Electricity produced by wind turbines should also be replaced by other methods of electricity production.

However, perhaps the most important function of the wind is that when water evaporates from the seas into the air, the wind carries that moist air over the continents, where the water falls on the ground.

If there was no wind, all the water would gradually flow into the sea and stay there. Continents would turn into dry deserts where it would never rain.

A very large part of land animals would probably become extinct as the habitats decrease, and humanity would hardly be able to continue living anywhere near the current extent.

Fortunately, winds cannot completely disappear, because the Sun’s heat creates new winds constantly.

Tiera Laitinen

investigator

Department of Meteorology