Venus and Mars terraforming

[peadar1987]

Correct me if I'm wrong but, as I understand it, one of the hurdles with terraforming either planet is that their magnetic fields are negligible, which means you have to constantly replenish the atmosphere. On Venus there seems to be some sort of natural carbon dioxide reservior, on Mars, well, I don't know but it's probably just gravity holding on to its thin atmosphere, there's likely some yearly loss. Distance from the Sun probably plays a big part in that as well.

The mechanisms are pretty poorly understood. From a gaseous diffusion perspective, Mars should be able to hold onto an atmosphere of carbon dioxide, nitrogen and oxygen for an almost indefinite period, although it would dry out over a period of a few hundred million years as the hydrogen in the water dissociated and was lost to space. The MAVEN probe is on its way to Mars now to try and shed a bit of light on what actually happened, if it's possible for the solar wind to have stripped the atmosphere away, of there might have been a giant impact, or even if Mars' tenuous magnetic field could even be contributing to the loss of the atmosphere by breaking it off into space in "bubbles".

Along with New Horizons, it's one of the space missions I'm most excited about just now.

[DerpenWolf]

The masses and delta-vs required are just too big.

It's more practical (although still incredible difficult, impossible without huge advances in technology) to use Neptune Trojans, if you nudge them using gravity assists. Blow off Venus' atmosphere and add mass to Mars by planning your impacts.

Yea, so far hitting Venus with big rocks does sound like the only "Easy" way to remove gas from Venus. But I'm curious, to actually get something of sufficient mass on a collision course with the Venus how could we move such a rock? Giant Orion style propulsion system with ALOT (WAY more than humanity has ever produced) of Nukes? Find a icy moon/dwarf planet and strap giant NERVA to it? Boosts by a spacecraft orbiting the object? A Goliath (probably stupidly impossible) solar sail? Small adjustments with LOTS of gravitational assists/desists? Idk what do you think could work?

Venus is a different can of worms, but IIRC the impaact that would bow off most of its atmosphere would also globaly melt the crust of the plane and send enough debris to endanger life on Earth.

Granted we might have to be careful of bits of the planet from nailing us but the whole global crust melting thing sounds as if it could be helpful to the heating of the planetary core... Sure the entire face of the planet may be changed but for the most part I don't think we would care to much about that, I mean we can't really explore the planets current surface very easily anyway so I doubt we'll miss it much...

[peadar1987]

Yea, so far hitting Venus with big rocks does sound like the only "Easy" way to remove gas from Venus. But I'm curious, to actually get something of sufficient mass on a collision course with the Venus how could we move such a rock? Giant Orion style propulsion system with ALOT (WAY more than humanity has ever produced) of Nukes? Find a icy moon/dwarf planet and strap giant NERVA to it? Boosts by a spacecraft orbiting the object? A Goliath (probably stupidly impossible) solar sail? Small adjustments with LOTS of gravitational assists/desists? Idk what do you think could work?

I was thinking a giant, nuclear powered ion engine that uses water from the body itself as the reaction mass. You'd probably only need a few hundred metres a second of delta-V to nudge one into an encounter with Neptune, and then if you were patient, gravity assists could do most of the rest of the work, with minor course corrections.

When I say "only" a few hundred metres a second of delta-v, you have to recognise what a monumental amount of energy it actually takes to accelerate a body the size of a comet or asteroid that much though.

[LABHOUSE]

Not to be a party crasher or anything but has there ever been a government that has ever committed to a century long project?

The longest project(s) that I am aware of that have been accomplished or are being worked on internationally are the ISS, ITER, and the SLS/ Manned asteroid to Mars program and the three of them are in the 20 to 30 year lifespan time frame.

Great wall of China... 700 years.

[YNM]

The mechanisms are pretty poorly understood. From a gaseous diffusion perspective, Mars should be able to hold onto an atmosphere of carbon dioxide, nitrogen and oxygen for an almost indefinite period, although it would dry out over a period of a few hundred million years as the hydrogen in the water dissociated and was lost to space. The MAVEN probe is on its way to Mars now to try and shed a bit of light on what actually happened, if it's possible for the solar wind to have stripped the atmosphere away, of there might have been a giant impact, or even if Mars' tenuous magnetic field could even be contributing to the loss of the atmosphere by breaking it off into space in "bubbles".

All of that is already proven as true, as well as gas captured by aging rocks. I guess MAVEN is to study all of them at once so we can know which one plays a major role.

Great wall of China... 700 years.

But that was done sections by sections. The Egyptians did made a lot of pyramids, which the construction time added up would reach centuries.

All the proposed idea here would require decades or centuries of constant work and support. No way to done it in sections.

[Red Iron Crown]

All the proposed idea here would require decades or centuries of constant work and support. No way to done it in sections.

One icy asteroid redirect mission at a time?

[Mighty1]

Just don't forget to install the switch to go from "suck" to "blow".

Anyone else think "Spaceballs"? lol

Megamaid

http://i1081.photobucket.com/albums/j350/jas1126/Spaceball_One_3_zps64cf9188.jpg

Edit: Ah, I see someone did. =D

[YNM]

All the proposed idea here would require decades or centuries of constant work and support. No way to done it in sections.

One icy asteroid redirect mission at a time?

But for certainty, ship technologies, crew training, and launch windows must be calculated... I mean, those Egyptians didn't plan to have that much pyramids in the end at start. Nor those Chinese did really plan to have a really long walls of bricks on mountains in the end at start (correct me if I'm wrong - I'm not a historian). Whilst our topic, we plan to have a second habitable planet in the end from the start, not just to have move a thing or two.

[Jetenginestar]

All the proposed idea here would require decades or centuries of constant work and support. No way to done it in sections.

Sections by sections? Sounds like and underground city is one way to go.

[LABHOUSE]

Sections by sections? Sounds like and underground city is one way to go.

Mega engineering documented that idea.

Well it wood take just a couple centuries if done right at most now let me do the math....

[FishInferno]

I do believe that terraforming mars is indeed possible, but is it ethical? Mars very well could support life, and terraforming would most likely destroy any ecosystem that mars has, even if it is just tiny bacteria.

[Horn Brain]

I do believe that terraforming mars is indeed possible, but is it ethical? Mars very well could support life, and terraforming would most likely destroy any ecosystem that mars has, even if it is just tiny bacteria.

Is it ethical to wash your hands with soap, knowing that you'll be killing millions of bacteria?

People >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> bacteria. Even Martian bacteria. We do what we need to ensure our survival, and in the case of Mars that means colonizing it to ensure that we can't be wiped out by a comet or other cataclysmic event on Earth. Any measures that are possible should be taken to preserve samples of any Martian life we find, but even if we do find active microbial life on Mars, it should not prevent us from colonizing it at the risk of destroying Martian life. The only utility that Mars life provides is its value for scientific study (unless we discover that it can do cool useful stuff that our bacteria can't).

[LABHOUSE]

Is it ethical to wash your hands with soap, knowing that you'll be killing millions of bacteria?

People >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> bacteria. Even Martian bacteria. We do what we need to ensure our survival, and in the case of Mars that means colonizing it to ensure that we can't be wiped out by a comet or other cataclysmic event on Earth. Any measures that are possible should be taken to preserve samples of any Martian life we find, but even if we do find active microbial life on Mars, it should not prevent us from colonizing it at the risk of destroying Martian life. The only utility that Mars life provides is its value for scientific study (unless we discover that it can do cool useful stuff that our bacteria can't).

Like cure cancer and all other diseases when ate while also extending our life a one time use of life extension infinite healing.

[YNM]

Regarding possible martian bacteria (or martian microbial life) : I'd rather believe these kind of life can actually living in new conditions. I mean, bacterias are among the most resistant form of life to changes in it's surroundings. Losing a higher level of CO2 or voltage gradient between martian topsoil and what lies beneath (proposed to actually can be used by bacterias to live) shpuldn't really kill them. Static voltage gradient on our electrical equipments and structures could become their new source of voltage gradient. Our presence might make them comparable to plants if they live off CO2. Really, I'm quite optimistic when it comes to bacterias.

A harder thing to cope with would still be the physical constraints of these planets.

[Vaporized Steel]

Venus is going to be troublesome.

Hey if we talk about vacuum cleaning venus why not go allout scifi.

The year is 9.000.000 through 10.000.000 AD.

Launch venus on a earth aproach transfer to our moon by any necessary method we might have learned by then. Let it hit our moon to give it a nice spin (grey little brat) Send bruce willis to clear up the large chunks falling to earth. Pour some iron in the Thousand mile venusian crater to strenghten its magnetic field with proper timing. Get rid of alot of atmosphere in the process. Let venus coast of a few hundreds Thousand miles (to lessen the tidal forces it would otherwise ruin earths climate) get venus in a nice circular orbit around earth a million miles out. Do the much more spare vaccuum cleaning job closer to home. Re live asteroid redirect *cough* I mean comet redirect to havoc massive rain on venus. Send trees, birds, pigs and cows on a venus collision course with parachutes. And we have the twin sister planet we Always wanted to have.

Sometimes the solution is closer then you think. Simpler or more realistic however is a completely different story.

[zilfondel]

Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars.

http://www.amazon.com/Red-Mars-Trilogy-Stanley-Robinson/dp/0553560735

If you haven't read it and you like terraforming, I highly recommend it. Too bad its rather dull, but hey! The books cover a scale of 100s of years and take place during the terraforming of Mars using icy bodies from the outer solar system.

[Redshift OTF]

Wasn't there an idea about lacing Venus's atmosphere with photosynthesising microbes that would turn the CO2 into O2?

[LABHOUSE]

Wasn't there an idea about lacing Venus's atmosphere with photosynthesising microbes that would turn the CO2 into O2?

Yes!!! Back in the 90's I thought there were no other nerds here that read the old 1994 library books on space! But it was meant to only be used to terraform the poles to be like the tropics.