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Warming a Tiny Piece of Mars For Terraforming

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the ants-under-the-magnifying-glass dept.

dptalia writes "It's been a dream of science fiction writers everywhere that we would eventually terraform Mars. Now an engineering student has proposed a way to terraform only a kilometer of Mars. By building an array of space based mirrors to focus the sun's light, a small area of Mars could be warmed to about 68 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius) which would make it easier for explorers to work and live there. Since Mars' atmosphere is thin, the mirrors would have to be carefully designed to prevent them from reflecting harmful radiation as well as light and warmth."

7 of 205 comments (clear)

  1. Water? by Jhon · · Score: 4, Interesting
    And the higher temperature would melt any water ice on the ground. This could make precious liquid water available for astronauts to drink, and the water could also be used as a raw material to produce rocket fuel for the journey home, Woida says.

    Wouldn't the melted ice boil away at 68 some odd degress on Mars? Or do they plan on heating up a kilometer sized pressurized dome?

    The extra warmth would mean the astronauts would not need heavily insulated suits or living quarters, allowing them to work more easily.

    Maybe not "heavily insulated", but certainly pressurized. Working "more easily" is still not easy.
    1. Re:Water? by CRCulver · · Score: 4, Interesting

      One is reminded of the opening chapter of Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars . It takes place in a tent town where the tent is made out of a purely transparent fabric that blocks radiation while still letting light through to make it seem as if folks are living openly on the surface.

      But then, what's the point of terraforming a tent town with these mirrors? You could get the same heat and light from a nuclear reactor powering strategically located lamps inside the structure. You can't terraform an open space on the surface, since any atmosphere you'd create would immediately flow into the near-vacuum that is most of the planet. I'm really scratching my head at while this idea is so clever.

    2. Re:Water? by Daniel_Staal · · Score: 3, Interesting

      It's clever because you don't actualy have to pressurise the surface to live there: a simple bodysuit can give the pressure you need, with SCUBA-style gear to make sure you've got enough oxygen. So if it is warm enough to not require active heating in the suits, you can make a suit thin enough to be worn as part of everyday clothing, which can be worn both inside and out. Then you just put on a helmet with air when you walk outside. Instead of having to put on a full pressure/temperature/air suit everytime you walk through the airlock.

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    3. Re:Water? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Err, what? Why do you think that a space-suit (and it's still one) can be a simple thing just because you need no insulation? The only thing you will get rid of is a bit of insulation and probably you will have to care for cooling instead, because working in a sealed pressure suit without body cooling by transpiration will overheat your body very fast.

      This is useless. The whole idea is just silly.

    4. Re:Water? by CRCulver · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The explorers are going to need power no matter what, and nuclear reactors are the most efficient option, so they're going to be landed anyway.

  2. Tornado by jamie · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I know Mars' atmosphere is thin. But wouldn't having a patch of dirt heated 120 deg C warmer than the rest of the planet force the air to rise over that spot, basically forming a permanent tornado?

  3. scientific error by bcrowell · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There's at least one scientific error in the article, which is that it talks about the risk of inadvertently focusing gamma rays with a mirror. You can't focus gamma rays with a mirror. A typical gamma, with an energy of 1 MeV, interacts with matter mainly via Compton scattering. At the low-energy end of the gamma spectrum (say 10 keV) it's mostly the photoelectric effect, while at the high end (10 MeV) it's pair production. None of these process obey the law of specular reflection. This would be a more legitimate concern with UV.

    I also wondered about the idea of melting water to form lakes on the surface. Mars's atmosphere is so thin that it would be considered a pretty decent vacuum by Earth standards. Won't the water boil off pretty rapidly in a near-vacuum at 30 degrees C?

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