Oktay74tn
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Mars Terraforming With Kuiper Belt Objects
Oktay Yürük aka Oktay74tn, science and tech content
https://imgur.com/user/Oktay74tn/posts
With an average surface temperature of -64°C, a very thin atmosphere and high levels of radiation on the surface, Mars is a very hostile planet for life. This video is about a new concept of terraforming Mars. Impacts of Kuiper belt objects are proposed to create a life-friendly environment for human colonization.
Kuiper belt objects are rich in volatile compounds like water, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane and nitrogen. Their journey to Mars would take 29 to 63 years. The Kuiper belt objects would have a fall velocity of 33 kilometers per second. Gravity assistance is needed to reduce the velocity of the impactor. This would prevent strong heating and loss of atmosphere.
The required amount of energy for this terraforming method is comparable to the current energy consumption of humanity within a few months to several years, depending on the selected variant. In the next step, specially bred organisms could convert water and carbon dioxide into oxygen.
Another concept for warming up Mars are automated factories that produce greenhouse gases such as sulfur hexafluoride SF6 from local resources. Due to the steric hindrance of the sulfur atom SF6 is a very inert compound. Its atmospheric lifetime on Earth is about 3200 years.
Mars does not have a global magnetic field. Solar wind strips the Martian atmosphere. There is a concept for a magnetic shield at the Lagrange point L1 of Mars and Sun. Charged particles from the Sun are deflected away from Mars. This would reduce the atmospheric loss and increase the density of the Martian atmosphere. Check out the picture.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Magnetic_shield_on_L1_orbit_around_Mars.png
A Scientist Has an Explosive Plan to Terraform Mars. It's So Wild That It Might Just Work.
Darren Orf
https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientist-explosive-plan-terraform-mars-180000601.html
Energy problems of terraforming Mars
Leszek Czechowski
https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2025/pdf/1858.pdf
Fundamental Physical and Resource Requirements for a Martian Magnetic Shield
Marcus DuPont, Jeremiah W. Murphy
https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.05546
Wikipedia articles
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraforming_of_Mars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_habitat
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Mars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellas_Planitia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuiper_belt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_hexafluoride
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun
Jarodamus
I have a concept of not destroying the one we live one too.
dalaiyoda
The biggest issue with terraforming Mars is the transnat corps essentially usurping UNOMA leading to a rise in accelerationism. (Currently rereading Green Mars because I never got around to Blue Mars the first time through.)
cuprohastes
Dude we can't even stop the planet we evolved on and live on from killing us, and you think you can fix Mars? With what? Magic Space Rocks we have no way to get to, move or control?
HumanCats
Can't we just make this planet better?
TychoTychoAlba
I think even with a breathable atmosphere, strong global mag field, oceans of water and a temperate climate, Martian soil is still basically soaked with the equivalent of bleach.
northerngermany
Time to reinstall "the planet crafter" !
Syko73
"Specially bred organisms could convert CO2 to O2".....so, Plants?
AgnosticPaladin
Lichens and algae, at first.
Vebrandsson
Plants need a lot of support to get going, you're not getting far with plants unless you have an ecosystem of pollenators and soil bacteria and other things like that. Early on in the development of life on earth it was a specific class of bacteria that produced the oxygen levels on earth for those ecosystems to establish themselves to begin with and that's where we'd have to start with mars.
RTK4740
The x-men already terra former Mars. It's now called Akkaro.
Gryphonosiris
Ok, hear me out on this: Stick a really big metal pole on the norther planetary pole, and another one of the southern planetary pole, then hook it up to a nuclear reactor and jump start the magnetic field, :-P /s
TTTT79
Billionaires playing cosmic Minecraft: terraforming Mars while Earth burns. Brilliant plan, what could possibly go wrong?
clueless2010
Perhaps, first, stop terraunforming earth.
Yellowchopsticks
We might as well just drop a giant ice cube in the ocean every so often, thus solving the problem once and for all.
gephasel2000
I'd prefer Titan - much denser atmosphere and lots of fuel already there
zagibu
Okay, frost vampire.
AgnosticPaladin
Titan is too far from the Sun, so it gets much less energy. You'd need a permanent assembly of mirrors or huge fusion generators in it's orbit.
Munchman347
So, rather than cleaning up the planet we already have and 'Terra-forming' all the pollution and mining scars, lets make a new planet that will spend every moment trying to kill everything on it's surface... 'No, no, that would be too expensive. You obviously have no Capitalist leanings!'...
unluckyandbored
If we're going to live long-term on Mars, we would ether need a way to give the planet some kind of magnetosphere so it can hold on to atmosphere and not just irradiate everything on the surface, or live entirely suberranean. Mars as far as we know is not tectonically active, so living underground would be relatively safe. Or, instead of doing all that, we could expend all that time and energy making THIS PLANET habitable. You know, the one we live on now. It'd be a lot easier to fix this one.
vindik8or
It'd take 10 million years for the sun to knock off an Earth-density atmosphere. The lack of magnetosphere is very, very far down the list of problems with terraforming Mars.
whatsisname
The lack of a magnetosphere is not really a problem if we had the ability to create an atmosphere in the first place in a reasonable amount of time. Even if we took 200 years to get it done, it would be a tiny, tiny fraction of that work to perpetually keep it "topped off".
stronomer
Yeah, let's not.
DrDadJokes
Oktay74tn
In my opinion, Total Recall is one of the best movies of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
MrWobblyHead
There's a book series known as The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. It's about the first set of colonists sent to Mars and how they started the process of terraforming the planet. It spans 100 years of the changes on Mars, the lives of those first colonists, and the new people that go to live there.
CaptCrobar
Sure we could create our own magnetic shield, but not at the scale of the planet. Unless we can come up with a way to get Mars spinning again, living on the surface of Mars will be difficult.
zagibu
What do you mean with spinning? Mars' rotation is almost the same as Earth's. It still has no magnetosphere.
CaptCrobar
The planet inner core isn't spinning as fast, if at all. We also dont know if it has any liquid to create a dynamo effect.
Freeasabird2015
It's all very nice but what about the lack of gravity? Our hearts beat against Earths' gravity, reduce that and we are in trouble. Mars is one third the size of Earth, human bodies are not designed for such a low gravity environment. After a while their organs would begin to fail. The overall time needed to get there and do anything at all is a death sentence for the astronauts.
AgnosticPaladin
Probably not a big enough problem; at least not compared to all others. And the time of a Earth-Mars trip can be shortened to a few weeks with a fusion drive, and a (big enough) ship can be spun to generate pseudo-gravity, or have spinning sections.
Freeasabird2015
Yes but that's a (therorical ship) not the planet. We can't increase the gravity on Mars, our blood pressure would tank and our organs would disintegrate. Thats a huge problem, and don't get me started on the fantasy of living on the moon stuff.
zagibu
Can I use the fusion drive of my car, or does it need a bigger one?
AgnosticPaladin
You'd need a much bigger car; probably not efficient.
On the bright side, no one will tailgate you.
Hooliganius
I'm all for going to Mars but the Moon is right there, far closer and more convenient in every way. That being said, the sooner we can launch Musk to Mars the better.
WoeToHice
Musk's genius would be wasted on Mars. We should send him to the Sun instead.
AgnosticPaladin
The moon is too small to keep an atmosphere; mars is (probably) around the lower limit.
vindik8or
Titan has an atmosphere that is denser than the Earth's. It's roughly double the size of the Moon and much smaller than Mars.
AgnosticPaladin
Titan is too far from the Sun, so it gets much less energy. You'd need a permanent assembly of mirrors or huge fusion generators in it's orbit.
vindik8or
My point isn't about going there to colonise it. My point is that size isn't the impediment to holding an atmosphere that you make it out to be. In fact the surface gravity of Titan is smaller than the Moon, and it still holds its vast atmosphere.
AgnosticPaladin
Titan is a special case, in that it's a satellite of a big gas giant. If it loses some of it's atmosphere, most of the gases will remain in Saturn's orbit, roughly in the same orbit as Titan. Then, after a few or more orbits, some of it will be recaptured by Titan. And other chunks of ice that are orbiting Saturn keep hitting it, compensating for loses.
UnitConversionBot
33 kilometers ≈ 20.5 miles
UnitConversionBot
-64°C ≈ -83.2 ° Fahrenheit or 209 Kelvin
ShieldAnvil1
Venus is the planet to terraform, that said why does this image show liquid water while also giving a temp 0f -63 c
AgnosticPaladin
One Venus day is 243 Earth days. Hard to have anything more complex than algae and bacteria with that. Also, Venus is probably too close to the sun to be stable after terraforming, will need a permanent partial shield.
Freeasabird2015
I agree, although its a true hellscape and rains lead we have more chance of actually living there if it was cleaned up than we ever will on mars.
vindik8or
Aerostat stations would sidestep all the hellish features of Venus. An Earth atmosphere mix of nitrogen and oxygen is bouyant at an altitude of 50km on Venus where the temperature and pressure is basically the same as Earth, and there is negligible sulfuric acid. It's not exactly terraforming, but it's vastly more hospitable than trying to live on Mars.
Freeasabird2015
Yes, Mars is not big enough for our bio, but it would be a challenge for humans to approach Venus with what you are suggesting, there are literally thousands of (active) volcanoes there so it would be a bit exciting for any visitors. (along with the lead rain and massive atmospheric pressure that flattens humans like bugs). But there is always hope, Star Trek taught me that. 👍
vindik8or
I think you missed the bit where we would be floating 50km above all of that bullshit. No lead rain, no volcanoes, a nice even 1 atm of pressure, and about 26°C temperature.
Freeasabird2015
I didn't but I can't see the point. Sorry not being rude but if humanity was to move to another planet the atmosphere of one is not the same thing. However, for research it would be an awesome way to study Venus. There is so much we don't know about that planet because of all the bullshit hiding it 👍
TonyDiethelm
How about if we make EARTH livable first?
WGTBaal
the only "advantage" i can see about trying the tech on Mars first is that if we are allowed some fuckups since the planet is dead already. so we could refine some of the technologies there for eventual use on Earth with higher confidence. Still leaves the magnetosphere issue though of course.
StewedTomaters
That money could be better spent here.
WGTBaal
i mean it is spent here. you send the end product to Mars but the money creates job and techs on Earth. Now i absolutely agree with you there are more urgent things but you can do multiple things at once. the money likely needed for that is a drop in the bucket when compared to military spending or private company assets
Flareside
Per aspera is a good game dealing in terra forming.
PapaJoeNH
We don't need humans destroying another planet
BladeTurMoiL
Better they destroy that one with no apparent life than the one we’re currently on.
zagibu
Oops, too late.
slidewhistlesymphony
Well, Mars does not have a magnetosphere to hold on to an atmosphere. This is a big no!
CrisprCAS
If we can create an atmosphere in 1000 years, losing it over 10 million years isn't a problem.
vindik8or
Exactly. A lot of people seem to get hung up on the magnetosphere like it's a gotcha, but ignore that any atmosphere we could build would last longer than the entire existence of the human species to date.
CrisprCAS
It is bad because of radiation. Something like 100x as much as Earth, and ~5x the annual limit for nuclear workers. I think that also gets overplayed. 250mSv/yr is bad, but it's not going to make you sick on a 5 year mission, even if it will make it somewhat more likely you develop cancer 10-15 years after you get back. Considering all the other risks, I'd say it's acceptable.
vindik8or
There are ways to manage radiation exposure without resorting to terraforming.
CrisprCAS
Well, yeah. One assumes that no one would be outside all that much, and exposure levels inside shouldn't be that high. Assuming zero indoor exposure, a daily excursion limit of 4h would keep people under the nuclear worker threshold. And honestly 4h/d sounds like way too much time outside for a Mars mission.
FaecalJacksonPollock
Nice idea, but I think we should focus on reversing the damage we've done to our own climate before fucking with another planet.
Wuz314159
"Releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere doesn't affect Earth." . . . . "Let's release carbon dioxide to terraform Mars."
WhyDontYouMakeMe
But how will you distract shareholders from your terrible management nosediving the company if you don't talk about going to mars every couple years?
SeekerOfFire
So I have bad news on that front... I promise you humanity will despoil numerous other worlds long before they make any meaningful effort to save any of them, earth included.
FaecalJacksonPollock
Bold of you to assume we will live long enough to even send more than a car-sized robot to other worlds every few years. ;)
SeekerOfFire
What can I say, I'm a hopeless optimist that we will someday overcome our nature of rejecting progress and become the alien-space-locust we deserve to be.
zagibu
Nah, thankfully, the virus called humanity will never leave this planet.
Dannoboyo
Want to make a planet livable? How about starting with earth ? Or is it only other planets where we can change the ability to sustain life to the positive. Yet another example of billionaires wanting to dominate the universe to demonstrate how great they are without contributing to improving the societies and economies that they were able to exploit.
cragath
Agreed and that should remain a priority, but for long-term survival we (humanity) also want an "off-site" back-up. If Earth experiences a gamma ray burst or large methane burst, we'd like to have a colony somewhere.
captapathy
The issue is, no one on Mars is going to protest or stop you from making Mars liveable. On earth, you got the oil lobby, Republicans, climate deniers, assholes, strip miners, polluters…
Oktay74tn
Yes, you are absolutely right. We have a big responsibility to keep Earth nice and habitable for future generations. The millionaires and billionaires have to pay their fair share, no more and no less. I find the big difference between income and capital gain taxes very unfair.
dalaiyoda
You're absolutely right that earth needs saving and protection, and it's also true that we're never going to terraform another planet when we can't control or isolate ourselves from this one. But there's also the whole eggs-in-one-basket problem. As much as humans can suck, it would be nice if there were some of us left to try to do better after The Asteroid comes and sends all the earth-dwellers off into the void.
StSob
The issue with this thinking is that Mars is too close to Earth anyway. Any cosmic threat to Earth would be either preventable with less tech than needed for terraforming Mars, or would wipe both planets anyway.
dalaiyoda
The terraforming is not the point. The techniques learnt for off-planet survival in the attempt thereof are.
zagibu
And you really, really think that the second time around we would do better? Sorry, but the average human is completely useless, and half of them are even worse than that.
ElbowDeepInUserSub
None of the "cool kids" want to think about the notion of terraforming as an escape from the gradual processes that are in action such as CO2 caused Global Warming. It's primarily about expansion to give us more room. The fact that colonies might function as an emergency fallback in the case of nuclear war or something is secondary. And bear in mind that space-based technology has long paid back tenfold on Earth, so it is worth exploring these ideas in any case.
zagibu
I'm sure a species that fucks up a naturally hospitable planet will fare well on a naturally inhospitable planet that takes a lot of effort to keep it hospitable.
LespritDeLescalier22
This. Every time I hear the reasoning that we need to fix human society before we go out to other planets and such, welp. We might as well just stay here. Humanity will NEVER eliminate its baser tendencies, and we’ll be lucky if we don’t shit the bed bad enough to kill us and every other living thing on this planet in the next 10 years. It is absolutely an “eggs in one basket” thing to me. If we can manage to get off of one planet, it will give us a greater likelihood of surviving as a
LespritDeLescalier22
Species. And the main purpose of this is To give our species more TIME to evolve and attempt to remedy our destructive tendencies. We have a horrible time applying deep time (at least deeper than the next 4-5 years,) to our thinking and imagining or even caring about the effects our actions have on generations we will never meet personally. I’m reminded of kotaku wamura. The man was a forward thinking individual who was ridiculed at the time for his “folly.”
zagibu
But why do you want to keep alive a species that fucks up paradise planets and even spread them to other worlds?
LespritDeLescalier22
Because we have SO MUCH potential as a species. Sure, we have all kinds of behavioral issues. Sure we can (and do) fuck things up. But we can CHOOSE. We can choose not to engage with destructive behavior. We can CHOOSE all these things. In time. We’re just not ready yet. But the choice is the key. And we definitely have the power to choose. And George Carlin stated that a cynic is just a disappointed idealist. I am an idealist. (And maybe you are too,) but don’t write off our potential.
LespritDeLescalier22
We are capable of amazing things. If we decide and choose to work together. I personally believe people are inherently good/neutral if they’re given the time and compassion necessary to grow. And we all are capable. Depending on how we choose. And that choice is freeing. We can choose to be free and realize our potential, or fail utterly. But the responsibility and freedom are ours to choose.
DoseOfScience
There's nobody pouring billions of dollars into the 'not colonizing mars' fund like there are for the various polluters.
ElbowDeepInUserSub
Again, money spent on space endeavors has essentially never failed to pay dividends to us in technological advancements on Earth. At least it used to, when it wasn't becoming privatized.
DoseOfScience
I was more bitching about how polluters pay politicians so they don't have to deal with the consequences, there's nobody really dumping money into not exploring space, except as a chance to score that money for themselves.
thrashingcows
The biggest issue with trying to terraform mars is the simple lack of a magnetosphere. The mars core is not moving enough to create one and without it any work to try and create a livable environment will be for naught since the suns cosmic/solar rays will just bake the surface and kill most of the work that’s being done.
somnif
Venus lacks an intrinsic magnetic field too. It gets away with things by having a beefy ionsphere that does the job.
MyBigMouth
Look Quiad, how many times have we gone through this, you just need to start the reactor.
Imalwaysready
Yeah, that’s covered in the text.
CloseupCaptionReaction
Wanna get backed? Take this baggy and watch the sun rise in Mars.
vindik8or
I don't think it's the biggest issue. The rate of stripping is orders of magnitude larger than the existence of the human species.
CyanideBreathMint
The biggest issue is the fucking thought of us ruining something else in an attempt to not correct our mistakes
backrideup9
You don't see the fact that terraforming technology doesn't even exist as the biggest issue? It's not like somebody is going to plant 100000000 trees and then Mars will be habitable overnight. The $$$ to develop whatever sci-fi inspired oxygen belching machine would almost certainly be less than just fixing Earth. But that's not the cool thing to do, I guess.
FallingStar7669
Terraforming Mars is a scientific curiosity held back by lack of technology and funding, both of which are hypothetically solvable problems. Fixing Earth requires humans to stop being greedy, and, well... slightly tougher nut to crack, that one...
CrossEyedPigeonToed
He hits on this a bit with the "specially bred organisms could convert water and carbon dioxide into oxygen." This is evolution though and could take millions of years for enough flora to develop to create that much oxygen. Fun idea, but the time tables are astronomical.
Wuz314159
Easier to terraform Titan.
AgnosticPaladin
Easier from a chemical pov, but Titan is too far from the Sun, so it gets much less energy. You'd need a permanent assembly of mirrors or huge fusion generators in it's orbit.
ki4clz
and the toxic soil that will effectively ‘bleach’ anything we put in the ground due to the high concentrations of perchlorates
and the dust that is basically giving cancer to all multicellular organisms
and the thin atmosphere
But… getting zapped constantly by Gama Radiation and other cosmic radiation would put a damper in planting anything in the red laundry detergent that makes up the martian soil
Oktay74tn
Martian soil contains 0.6% perchlorate ClO4- which is toxic, explosive and soluble in water. It can be washed out or destroyed by controlled heating. Theoretically, the perchlorate could be used as a source for chlorine.
ki4clz
It would be easier to terraform Venus
AgnosticPaladin
One Venus day is 243 Earth days. Hard to have anything more complex than algae and bacteria with that. Also, Venus is probably too close to the sun to be stable after terraforming, will need a permanent partial shield.
thrashingcows
Read about the floating cities hypothesis for Venus…very interesting and seems a more likely candidate for an extraterrestrial human colony.
Oktay74tn
Yes, that's why I like the concept of an artificial magnetic shield for Mars at the Lagrange point L1 of Mars and the Sun.
stronomer
That's not a concept. That's wishful thinking, and what you linked is a drawing that shows a what-if there were some magical shield. It's not real, it's not a concept.
robsxe
I have also read about setting up a series of nuclear plants across Mars to generate a magnetic field. And for more fun reading you should look up cloud city ideas for Venus that does have a magentosphere
thrashingcows
Yup I’ve read about colonizing Venus…seems like a quicker and cheaper option than mars.
Wuz314159
A conventional magnetic shield at L1 to block solar winds also blocks solar light. We don't have Star Trek shields.
Oktay74tn
As far as I know it could protect Mars against the charged particles from the Sun, not block the light.
Wuz314159
But you can't find an image of something that doesn't exist?
DoseOfScience
That... doesn't sound right? My understanding is that the solar winds are primarily charged particles, the mag field is there to deflect them from blasting the atmo loose. I still firmly think the moon is a better stepping stone as a fuel/material supply before reaching to the Earth/Moon trojans. Yeeting a few kuiper belt objects is a very very long term project.
Wuz314159
We don't have Star Trek shields. . . We have Faraday Cages. Like on your microwave door.
DoseOfScience
We do in fact have magnetic field generators that can deflect charged particles. That is literally what a magnet does. We're not deflecting kinetic weapons, we're deflecting a low pressure spray of hydrogen and such.
CrisprCAS
What? No. It's a magnet, it doesn't block visible light.
Wuz314159
Where are you going to find this planet sized magnet? The only shields we have are Faraday Cages.
StSob
Theres no need for a planet-sized magnet. The paper OP posted suggests that a 10 km radius superconducting magnet would be enough to do the job, and thats a size of a large asteroid. However the same paper shows that it would require too much rare earth materials and its more feasible to build the magnet on Mars instead.
CrisprCAS
You don't need a planet sized magnet.