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The Age of the Earth: Helium In Rocks

How old is the earth? Billions of years or just thousands of years?

Helium results from radioactive decay, and quickly leaks out of rocks. Yet rocks contain large amounts of helium. All of the helium should have leaked out in less than 100,000 years. This means rocks dated to be over a billion years old are actually less than 100,000 years old.

Not only does helium in rocks provide evidence the earth is young, the lack of helium in the atmosphere provides additional evidence. Approximately 67 grams of helium escape from rocks and enter the atmosphere every second, it would have taken only about two million years to build up the amount of helium we observe in the atmosphere today-- assuming the atmosphere started with zero helium. Of course, it is unlikely that the earth started with zero helium. But, even with that assumption this gives a maximum age of the earth of two million years, which is not even close to the claimed age for the earth of 4.54 billion years.

More Information

Helium In Radioactive Rocks (AIG Article)

Blowing Old-Earth Belief Away (CMI Article)