How To 

How to Terraform Mars

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Could we ever actually live on Mars?

This is a serious question that everyone from Elon Musk, to top scientists, to everyday people are thinking about. Should we be making preparations to create a new home out in the solar system, and even if we should, can we? There are a few different ways we could make it work, one of which is through terraforming Mars. But what exactly is terraforming, and how would we do it? Here’s how.

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1. Define terraforming.
Before you can start terraforming, you need to know what it means. Terraforming is altering a planet to make it suitable for Earth’s animal life, including humans. It involves assessing the current livability of a planet (in Mars’ case, zero) and evaluating what is needed to make it suitable for life. This doesn’t necessarily mean we need the ability to recreate Earth and society as we know it, but it doesn’t include living in space suits. The goal is to create a place where life can continue on relatively normally.

2. Thicken Mars’ atmosphere.
One of the biggest problems with living on Mars currently is the fact that the red planet has very little atmosphere. It’s too small to generate a magnetic field like the Earth does, so over the years the Sun has blown away its atmosphere, leaving it exposed to radiation and freezing cold temperatures. To make the planet livable, we would need to get that atmosphere back. This in and of itself is a gargantuan task. Some ideas have included releasing the CO2 trapped in Mars’ ice caps, but NASA recently studied the idea and concluded that there isn’t enough CO2 on Mars to create a sufficient atmosphere. Greenhouse gases would instead need to be transported to the planet from sources that include asteroids, Earth itself, and even the moons of other planets.

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3. Lower the planet’s albedo.
Mars reflects much of the sunlight it receives back out into space, keeping the planet unbearably cold. One way to up the warmth would be to lower the planet’s albedo, or its reflectivity. This could be done by adding dark, low-albedo materials to the planet’s surface, or even placing plants that are dark in color close to the polar caps. If they work, these two methods could not only make the climate warmer, but also help the polar caps melt, releasing liquid water and CO2 in the process.

4. Introduce oxygen.
Humans need to breathe, which is a problem on Mars. The lack of a substantial atmosphere means there’s not enough oxygen to allow us to breathe without assistance. We would either have to cart oxygen around, which isn’t feasible in the long term, or we would need to alter the atmosphere once again and introduce massive amounts of oxygen. We could use photosynthetic organisms, but the amount of time it would take to create sufficient oxygen and an ozone layer makes the idea impractical. There’s a lot of technology we will need before terraforming becomes possible, but the ideas are out there. The time may one day come when we need them.
 
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Oct 23, 2019
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I guess it depends on how much time we are willing to take. Unless we become a theoretical level 2 civilization, I think that we can only do this with an incredibly long project.

It would seem that we first need to locate a bunch of small comets and asteroids and redirect them so that they impact Mars over several thousand years. This will deliver the material we need to make Mars habitable. Then we have to arrange that material, which will probably take many thousand more years.

In that amount of time, we could probably find many other better candidate planets within a hundred light years or so and just plan on colonizing them instead.

We'll eventually have to move Mars out of the way if we want to save the Earth anyway. As the sun gets hotter, we're going to need to move the Earth out to where Mars is so it doesn't get baked by the sun. This means we need to send Mars out. This won't be critical for a billion years or so, so we have time to do this slowly, but I'd hate to waste all the effort on Mars, just to send it out of the solar system when it gets to be in the way. I guess if we were really good, we could make so that Earth and new Mars could become a binary planet system.
 
I guess it depends on how much time we are willing to take. Unless we become a theoretical level 2 civilization, I think that we can only do this with an incredibly long project.
None of the scenarios that I have ever seen could “terraform” Mars in anything less than several thousand years, and then only at a cost of several times the total gross energy output of the Earth. Remember, we currently have 6 billion people doing their best to add heat and pollution to our planet with virtually negligible effect.

The problem with creating a breathable atmosphere on Mars is the sheer volume that would be required. Few people can grasp the concept of trillions of tons of gasses that would have to be ADDED to Mars, AND in the correct proportions. Trying to bring that in with comets would not only require an incredible amount of energy, and take a veeeery loooong time, but each would also bring in enough dust to create a nuclear winter.
 
The weak gravity of Mars cannot hold an Earth type atmosphere. Even though the atmosphere on Mars is only 6% of Earth normal, it extends so high above the surface that the Odyssey 2001 Orbiter was aerobraking at the same altitude above the surface of Mars that we consider space here on Earth. That is the altitude (100 km) that won the $10 million prize for the first civilian craft to enter space. Even if we could provide the 800 trillion tons of gasses to create an atmosphere, it would be quickly and continually stripped away by the solar wind.
 
Nov 25, 2019
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oR4xecF.jpg


Could we ever actually live on Mars?

This is a serious question that everyone from Elon Musk, to top scientists, to everyday people are thinking about. Should we be making preparations to create a new home out in the solar system, and even if we should, can we? There are a few different ways we could make it work, one of which is through terraforming Mars. But what exactly is terraforming, and how would we do it? Here’s how.

FQeiy1S.jpg


1. Define terraforming.
Before you can start terraforming, you need to know what it means. Terraforming is altering a planet to make it suitable for Earth’s animal life, including humans. It involves assessing the current livability of a planet (in Mars’ case, zero) and evaluating what is needed to make it suitable for life. This doesn’t necessarily mean we need the ability to recreate Earth and society as we know it, but it doesn’t include living in space suits. The goal is to create a place where life can continue on relatively normally.

2. Thicken Mars’ atmosphere.
One of the biggest problems with living on Mars currently is the fact that the red planet has very little atmosphere. It’s too small to generate a magnetic field like the Earth does, so over the years the Sun has blown away its atmosphere, leaving it exposed to radiation and freezing cold temperatures. To make the planet livable, we would need to get that atmosphere back. This in and of itself is a gargantuan task. Some ideas have included releasing the CO2 trapped in Mars’ ice caps, but NASA recently studied the idea and concluded that there isn’t enough CO2 on Mars to create a sufficient atmosphere. Greenhouse gases would instead need to be transported to the planet from sources that include asteroids, Earth itself, and even the moons of other planets.

2rBaFte.jpg


3. Lower the planet’s albedo.
Mars reflects much of the sunlight it receives back out into space, keeping the planet unbearably cold. One way to up the warmth would be to lower the planet’s albedo, or its reflectivity. This could be done by adding dark, low-albedo materials to the planet’s surface, or even placing plants that are dark in color close to the polar caps. If they work, these two methods could not only make the climate warmer, but also help the polar caps melt, releasing liquid water and CO2 in the process.

4. Introduce oxygen.
Humans need to breathe, which is a problem on Mars. The lack of a substantial atmosphere means there’s not enough oxygen to allow us to breathe without assistance. We would either have to cart oxygen around, which isn’t feasible in the long term, or we would need to alter the atmosphere once again and introduce massive amounts of oxygen. We could use photosynthetic organisms, but the amount of time it would take to create sufficient oxygen and an ozone layer makes the idea impractical. There’s a lot of technology we will need before terraforming becomes possible, but the ideas are out there. The time may one day come when we need them.
I believe Mars was occupied millions of years ago. Something happened and they lost their planning in their lives. I think if you dig down deep enough you'll find artifacts. I don't believe we should live on Mars because the atmosphere is not going to be safe for us
 
I believe Mars was occupied millions of years ago. Something happened and they lost their planning in their lives. I think if you dig down deep enough you'll find artifacts. I don't believe we should live on Mars because the atmosphere is not going to be safe for us
Upon what do you base your belief of previous life on Mars? What information is available that would support that belief?
The atmosphere is currently only 6% the density of Earth and mostly CO2, but that is not a factor since planned habitats will be enclosed and have their own atmosphere.
 

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