• Question: Is it possibly to find dry ice naturally

    Asked by KaiF to Olivia, Leonie, Joe, James, Anna on 13 Mar 2015.
    • Photo: Joe Spencer

      Joe Spencer answered on 13 Mar 2015:

      KaiF,
      Good question, dry ice is frozen CO2 (carbon dioxide), which is ‘ice’ at around -78 degrees C.
      So, I’d say it’s possible to find dry ice naturally in places on earth where temperatues reach lower than this, (in antartica there’s temperatures recorded lower than this). But the thing is there’s not enough CO2 there to freeze, as air only contains a small % of CO2. So probably not enough to notice.
      Now of course you could alter conditions, like atmospheric pressure, CO2 concentration, being in upper atmosphere but then it’s no longer naturally forming and requiring humans to make it.

    • Photo: James Pope

      James Pope answered on 13 Mar 2015:

      Hi KaiF,

      I think dry ice naturally occurs on Mars as the Martian ice caps, so as Joe says above you would just need CO2 at the right temperature and pressure to be frozen. Sadly, the coldest ever temperature recorded is -89 degrees celcuis (once!) so it is unlikely to ever happen on Earth for that reason!

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