Did Kerbin have ice ages and tectonic movement?

[awsumguy76801]

I'm wondering what people imagine Kerbin would have looked like in an ice age and what its continents may have looked like in the past.

[jimmymcgoochie]

Well, it’s a fictional planet, so no; but if you want to do some world-building/role-playing/whatever in the Kerbal-verse, then I see no reason why it wouldn’t have hot/cold cycles in its past.

Earth’s climate has cycles that vary over many time periods, from a few years (e.g. El Niño), to many years (Pacific Decadal Oscillation), to centuries or even millennia; throw in an inclined and slightly eccentric orbit around the Sun, a significant axial tilt, active geology and abundant biology and you get a dynamic climate that can vary by many degrees Celsius.

While Kerbin’s orbit is much more regular than Earth’s (no inclination, eccentricity or axial tilt to worry about), the rest would still hold true. A combination of varying solar output, natural biological and geological processes (including volcanoes and plate tectonics, but also weathering of rocks which could absorb or release gases) and gravitational effects from the Mun (and possibly a slow fall of material from Minmus onto Kerbin’s upper atmosphere) could readily change Kerbin’s global climate. That huge crater on the opposite side of Kerbin to the KSC has been suggested by some to be an impact site, which would have been cataclysmic for the global climate when it happened, however it could just as easily be the remains of a supervolcano’s caldera which when it erupted would have a similar effect.

Edited June 19, 2021 by jimmymcgoochie

[awsumguy76801]

Actually I just thought of it. Earth has ice ages because of its axial tilt and kerbin has 0 axial tilt. So it would be impossible for Kerbin to have an ice age because of its tilt but maybe Kerbin is just in a period where it is upright and the influence of Jool will pull it back into a tilted position and start an ice age. A topic talking about the influence of Jool on the other planets would be pretty interesting.

Edited June 20, 2021 by awsumguy76801