Will pollution have any affect on the Earth’s gravity in the future?

Question: Will pollution have any affect on the Earth's gravity in the future?
- Keywords:
  Earth,
  future,
  pollution
Asked by 892grak46 to Daniel, Hannah, Maggie, Ry, Scott on 10 Nov 2017.
- Ry Cutter answered on 10 Nov 2017:
  
  No, but that would be the least of our worries.
  Pollution is causing the Earth to heat up. Carbon dioxide is very good at absorbing and reflecting thermal energy from the sun. It keeps the heat on Earth like a greenhouse, that’s why it’s called the greenhouse effect.
  The other issue with pollution is that the air becomes poisonous, not only for humans. There have been reports in places with high pollution (like Hong Kong) that people are running out of breath on short walks because there is so much smoke in the air.
  We need more scientists to help rectify the problem before it gets worse!
  Great question,
  Ryan
- Hannah Middleton answered on 10 Nov 2017:
  
  No, pollution wont have an effect on Earth’s gravity because the overall mass of the Earth is still the same. But it does cause a lot of other problems!
- Maggie Lieu answered on 10 Nov 2017:
  
  Well let’s have a think about it. If we increase pollution, this would increase the temperature of the Earth. This means that Earth would lose some of its mass and have a slightly lower gravity (although the amount would probably be tiny!). Also if the temperature increases then the ice caps would melt and the distribution of mass would change on the Earth. This means in local areas the gravity would also change depending on if there is more or less water there.
- Scott Melville answered on 13 Nov 2017:
  
  Instead of talking about atmospheric pollution, I’ll say something interesting about how we’re polluting space. It’s actually really bad, because there are lots of old satellites up there in the sky, and occasionally they break up and fall apart into pieces, creating a swarm of little bits of metal. If it keeps getting worse, then in future we won’t be able to launch any new satellites, and maybe one day we’ll be trapped on Earth because we can’t safely cross all of the satellite debris. It’s called Kessler Syndrome:
  http://www.spacesafetymagazine.com/space-debris/kessler-syndrome/
- Daniel Williams answered on 13 Nov 2017:
  
  No. We’ll need to worry about lots of things, but not that.
  
  The Earth’s mass stays the same even as it gets more polluted, because all the things making the pollution came from the earth in the first place. That means its gravitational pull stays the same.