Scientist Calls Mars a Terraforming Target

Raver32 writes "Mars will be transformed into a shirt-sleeve, habitable world for humanity before century's end, made livable by thawing out the coldish climes of the red planet and altering its now carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere. How best to carry out a fast-paced, decade by decade planetary face lift of Mars — a technique called "terraforming" — has been outlined by Lowell Wood, a noted physicist and recent retiree of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and a long-time Visiting Fellow of the Hoover Institution. Lowell presented his eye-opening Mars manifesto at Flight School, held here June 20-22 at the Aspen Institute, laying out a scientific plan to "experiment on a planet we're not living on.""

Two problems I'm not seeing addressed here

[jollyreaper]

First, Mars does not have a magnetosphere. This helps fend off the worst of the cosmic radiation here on Earth. What does he propose to replace it? The article is light on the details. Second, isn't the understanding still that Mars has insufficient gravity to preserve its atmosphere and so the solar wind strips the atoms and molecules right off the top, thus explaining the low pressure we see today? How do you counter that?

Re:Necessity Breeds Invention

[grub]

Only when the political will to do so is required, say population explosion is causing massive food/energy shortages will something like this possibly be considered.

It costs huge amounts of money to send every kilogram to orbit let alone Mars. If they do get Mars to a colonizable state anytime soon they won't be sending millions of Average Joe's to live there anytime soon.

Getting off the rock

[the_kanzure]

Copied from my notes [heybryan.org]:

• The Artemis Project [asi.org] - The project is a private venture to establish a permanent, self-supporting community on the Moon. Brief overview of the Artemis project [asi.org].
• The Mars Society [marssociety.org] - To further the goal of the exploration and settlement of the Red Planet.
• The Moon Society [moonsociety.org] - An international nonprofit educational and scientific foundation formed to further the creation of communities on the Moon involving large-scale industrialization and private enterprise.
• National Space Society [nss.org] - grassroots organization dedicated to the creation of a spacefaring civilization. Magazine [space.com].
• Stanford on the Moon [spaceagepub.com] (by 2015?) And yes, Stanford as in the university.
• Space Frontier Foundation [space-frontier.org] - seems to have projects for space colonization, missions to the Earth's moon, and so on. Looks like a large scale organization.
• The Space Settlement Initiative [spacesettlement.org]
• Space Access Society [space-access.org] - activism for getting out of the NASA-only paradigm/reality.
• Students for the Exploration and Development of Space [seds.org] - `... is dedicated to expanding the role of human exploration and development of space. We also seek to educate the public in such a way as to attain this goal. `
• Space Studies Institute [ssi.org] - `SSI's stated mission is: Opening the energy and material resources of space for human benefit by completing the missing technological links to make possible the productive use of the abundant resources in space.`
• International Space University [isunet.edu] - `The International Space University provides graduate-level training to the future leaders of the emerging global space community at its Central Campus in Strasbourg, France, and at locations around the world. ` (mentions 'systems engineering' on the About page)
• Space Settlement Institute [space-sett...titute.org] - `The Space Settlement Institute is a non-profit association founded to help promote the human colonization and settlement of outer space. `
• Cygo's Space Initiative [cygo.com] - plan and conduct exploration missions to minor planets, build and mass produce (while in space) a multi-purpose interconnectable module, and to offer products and services using space and the materials therefrom.
• Freeluna [freeluna.com] - `Freeluna.com is dedicated to the proposition that the colonization of outer space is critical for the long term survival of the human species, and that colonization of the moon and the exploitation of the moon's natural resources is one of the very best first steps in that incredible journey off planet.` ... and when I first visited this page, I was visitor #3371. Yikes. Contact: Bill Clawson, [e-mail]
• Island One Society [islandone.org] - associated with the Artemis society, seems to be mostly a resource-help site.
• The Living Universe Foundation [luf.org] - `The Living Universe Foundation seeks to bring the galaxy alive with life from Earth, while healing the damage that humanity has already inflicted upon the Earth. We believe that expansion into space in the immediate future is a step towards accomplishing this aim.` [e-mail] --- This organization was inspired by the publication of a certain book. This is heavily related to Project Atlantis or Oceania [oceania.org] (artifical floatin

I hate to be negative, but

[Progman3K]

Mars will NEVER be habitable.
We'd have to find a way to get its dead core molten and spinning again. Otherwise solar radiation will just flay off any atmosphere we try to put there.

Maybe we could live on Mars in domes or sealed caves but I doubt we'll ever be walking about in the open on its surface.

Re:Two problems I'm not seeing addressed here

[ekasteng]

If I had mod points I'd give you one. If my memory is correct, Earth's spinning liquid metal core is what gives us our magnetosphere, and protects our upper atmosphere from getting "sandblasted" away by the solar wind. Mars doesn't have a magnetoshpere, which is the reason why some astronomers think its core has cooled and is solid. Without that magnetosphere, the solar wind will just blast whatever atmosphere we put on it away.

Re:Planting?

[menkhaura]

I believe the real problem isn't the climate, or the high carbon dioxide atmosphere; the real problem is that Mars's atmosphere is very low density. The air pressure in Mars (less than 1% of that on Earth according to Wikipedia) won't be sufficient for us earthlings to breathe comfortably if at all.

Re:"Will"?

[WormholeFiend]

then we'll have to build enclosures that contain their own atmosphere

Like Biosphere 2 [wikipedia.org]?

It didn't work that well (at least for the humans involved)... And it was built right here, where material, financial and human resources are easily available.

Solar Danger

[allometry]

Have these scientists forgot that Mars has almost no magnetic field and atmosphere?

The magnetic field of a planet protects the atmosphere and surface from radiation sent off by the sun. Without this, tremendous amounts of radiation reach the planet's atmosphere and surface. If we were to rebuild the atmosphere, we would find that we just wasted our time, because there is no magnetic field to deflect any incoming radiation. The effects of the sun would essentially knock the new atmosphere off the planet and into space.

Re:Then who owns Mars?

[The One and Only]

If only you'd learned the first rule of empire--never piss off a group of colonists with a shorter supply line than your own :)

Re:Terraforming...

[halivar]

I'm only a lay-man, and I only know what I read in textbooks. If any of this is wrong, please correct me.

Some problems with this whole scheme.

1) Rich in carbon-dioxide, but only relatively. The atmosphere is so thin that even if the CO2 were converted to a more human-friendly mix, it's still too thin, and too cold.
2) The atmosphere can't be enriched with more material because Mars can't hold it. Too gravity, and not a strong enough magnetosphere (which is how Venus holds it atmosphere).
3) No internal dynamo. Mars has a cold core, leading the aforementioned problems.

Re:KSR wrote it first

[drinkypoo]

Problem with KSR's plan is that it involves rerouting comets and sending them through Mars' atmosphere. Basically the whole thing is based on technologies that don't yet exist. Great books (I own/read them all) but not that practical in the short time scale. I like the soletta mirror a lot, though, I think that was the best thing in there (short of the space elevator, whose relevance is widely known already.)

Re:"Will"?

[SatanicPuppy]

The point behind Biosphere was to create a naturally self-sustaining system, so they weren't supposed to use CO2 scrubbers or any such similar technology. Additionally, it was determined that the concrete foundations were binding CO2 as they cured (concrete cures for years and years), causing still more problems.

Blah blah blah. It was a total screwup, not just in management, but in pure conception. They needed to start with a working system and then figure out how to make it self sufficient, instead of starting with a system that they thought would work, and trying to live in it indefinitely. Does anyone really think we'd start off with a system that needed no outside inputs? It's not realistic. Basically the only thing they proved is that they didn't do very well at making a self-sustaining system.

Re:Go to Mars Quaid...

[MS-06FZ]

We Can Remember it for You Wholesale was the basis for Total Recall, and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep was the basis for Bladerunner. Not to enter the debate about whether the movies should have followed the original Philip K. Dick, but you at least have to know the relationships.

I was not confusing Total Recall and Bladerunner (to use the rather less elaborate titles...) I was just providing another example of Title Bitching. I could as easily have said "Excuse me, sir, but the proper title is Macross" or "I can see by your use of the title Godzilla that you are not familiar with the original film..." Just imagine it in a Simpsons "Comic Book Guy" voice - it could be about just about anything steeped in nerd-contention.

Re:Terraforming...

[Anonymous Coward]

The major problem with no internal dynamo is that the planet does not generate a magnetic field and would allow a far greater amount of harmful radiation to reach the surface, even if an atmosphere is present it could not shield life from invading charged particles which would lead to rapid genetic mutation and cancerous cells.

Throwing my theory into doubt

[benhocking]

Here's a "kids" page, that addresses the magnetic field [nasa.gov] of Mars (and Venus). As Venus also has very little magnetic field, perhaps I'm wrong about that whole stripping thing. This site [ucla.edu] seems to be saying that it's a combination of Mars' low gravity and weak magnetic field. Keep in mind that Titan (with its weak gravity) also has an atmosphere. OTOH, Mercury with a very strong magnetic field does not have an atmosphere. Just some rambling thoughts.

Re:Getting off the rock

[johno.ie]

I noticed you didn't include http://permanent.com/ [permanent.com] in your list. IMHO it is quite a good site concerning space colonisation. I have no affiliation with the site btw.

Re:they're ignoring the nitrogen!

[hkmarks]

We don't need it to breathe, no. But we need fixed nitrogen [wikipedia.org] in soil for the plants we depend on to grow. The atmospheric nitrogen (inert N2) is fixed by microorganisms into usable forms. Without fixed nitrogen, you can't have DNA or proteins.

Someday, hopefully we'll have the resources to get nitrogen compounds like ammonia from the outer solar system to Mars.

Re:Two problems I'm not seeing addressed here

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the stable Lagrange points (trailing and leading) are only stable if the mass of the objects there is negligible

Venus is not negligible

In fact, according to the Giant Impact Hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_creation [wikipedia.org], a giant object falling from a Lagrange point smacked into the Earth and formed the moon
I'd prefer if Venus wasn't in the same position

Re:why not Venus?

[John Meacham]

Actually, although terraforming is not really feasable, venus is actually a very attractive place to build a colony. Although the surface of the planet is quite inhospitable, at cloud top level conditions are extremely well suited for earth life. In addition, breathable air is a lifting gas, so your colony naturally floats on the cloudtops and solar energy is very abundant.

http://powerweb.grc.nasa.gov/pvsee/publications/ve nus/VenusColony_STAIF03.pdf [nasa.gov]