Terraforming the Moon - Your opinion, please

m1omg · 2007-07-03 11:56:21

That 300 years figure is AFAIK not true, because in Celestia ED it was shown that Moon had a thin atmosphere for a few billion years from volcanic primordeal gases.
The Moon's lack of atmosphere is mainly because the Moon was poor in gas and all volatiles from the beggining and because that thin atmosphere wasn't sufficient to entabilish ionosphere that will protect it - contrary to popular belief, the magnetic field is not required - as long there is a charged particle radiation blocking ionosphere.
For me there is no obstacle in terraforming Moon other than finances.
Crash some CO2 and water rich comets to it, seed it with Ceredian ice (it was recently shown to have more frozen water than is all supply of fresh water on Earth!), bring some microbes and you will have a paradise Moon.

According to this calculator ; http://www.transhuman.talktalk.net/iw/Geosync.htm ;

The Moon is capable of retaing CO2 up to a temperature of 7 degress Celsius and oxygen up to -70 deg. Celsius so there will be a slight leak but neglible in the time of the human's civilization existence from it's beggining.

m1omg · 2007-07-03 12:05:58

Tom Kalbfus,
Lots of heat for sure.
I wonder what would happen to the atmosphere of titan with wide scale files from introduced o2?
Might be a good thing that the water ice stays in frozen state on Titan.
Titan is an awesome place for a colony, with frozen water split as 02 and hydrogen, methane rain as inexhaustible fuel source and a thick atmosphere for radiation protection.
I would expect Titan to be a city like enclosed colony that is self sufficient almost immediately as its established.
Well any of the frozen satellites will have an atmosphere if heated, Europa, Callisto, Ganymede, and Titan. The first three would have atmospheres that consisted of water vapor. Some of that water vapor would leak into space only to be replaced by water vapor further evaporated from the liquid ocean below.
First thing that would happen over the airless icy Gallileans is that the icy surface would sublimate away, but the Moon's gravity would retain some of that water vapor for a time, the pressure would build up to the point where the icy surface can then melt rather than sublime. You'd have a moon with a liquid ocean under a water vapor atmosphere, probably surrounded by a perpetual layer of water clouds that are constantly raining toward the surface while water constantly evaporates from the ocean below.
In Titan's case, it has a largely nitrogen atmosphere. The nitrogen would escape to be gradually replace by water vapor and other gasses that were previously locked in the ice. What you'd have eventually is a "boiling moon". These moons can boil for quite some time, if they boil too much, the the atmosphere of water vapor would buld up and cease the ocean's boiling, if it rains too much or water escapes into space, the the pressure would drop and the oceans would begin boiling again.

AFAIK Galileian satelites will be as hot as Venus if moved into Earthlike distance.
Move it into the inner asteroid belt, then there will be atmosphere about 2x as dense as Mars's and ice will be only a few METERS thick and ocean life may evolve further into photosynthetic stage because of the light.
When moved closer to the Sun it would dessicate, vapor will leak until the moon is dry.
Read http://www.worlddreambank.org/O/OISIN.HTM .

noosfractal · 2007-07-03 16:47:53

That 300 years figure is AFAIK not true, because in Celestia ED it was shown that Moon had a thin atmosphere for a few billion years from volcanic primordeal gases.
The Moon's lack of atmosphere is mainly because the Moon was poor in gas and all volatiles from the beggining and because that thin atmosphere wasn't sufficient to entabilish ionosphere that will protect it - contrary to popular belief, the magnetic field is not required - as long there is a charged particle radiation blocking ionosphere.

The 300 year figure is just for thermal escape, it doesn't even take into account stripping by the solar wind

According to this calculator ; http://www.transhuman.talktalk.net/iw/Geosync.htm ;
The Moon is capable of retaing CO2 up to a temperature of 7 degress Celsius and oxygen up to -70 deg. Celsius so there will be a slight leak but neglible in the time of the human's civilization existence from it's beggining.

-70 Celsius doesn't meet the usual criteria of terraforming, and I'm sure you can appreciate how quickly billions of years would become hundreds since thermal escape is governed by a power law.

Crash some CO2 and water rich comets to it, seed it with Ceredian ice (it was recently shown to have more frozen water than is all supply of fresh water on Earth!), bring some microbes and you will have a paradise Moon.

I think you're being a little optimistic here, but I hope we both get to walk in lunar forests one day

Spatula · 2007-07-03 21:05:55

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface. It also seems to be valuable simply as a vacuum staging area for lots of industries. Subsurface colonies that utilize the deep interior heat might work though.

noosfractal · 2007-07-03 22:13:23

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface.

Feel free to intellectually cripple yourself with premature, ill-informed judgements - god knows you won't be in the minority - the rest of us will continue to examine the possibility until actual evidence rules it out, as if scientists.

Antius · 2007-07-04 05:57:11

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface. It also seems to be valuable simply as a vacuum staging area for lots of industries. Subsurface colonies that utilize the deep interior heat might work though.

If the moon had a magnetic field strong enough to deflect the solar wind, then it is a fair bet that it would have retained a thick atmosphere to this day. A synthetic magnetic field, produced by a superconducting ring around the equator, would allow the moon to hold on to an atmophere indefinitely, for as long as the field was kept in place.

In fact, it is possible to terraform much smaller worlds than the moon, simply be providing a magnetic field strong enough to capture any escaping ions from the ionosphere. For very small worlds, the mass of gas required to produce a tollerable surface pressure becomes so large that the atmosphere would account for a significant fraction of the total mass of the body. To produce a 1 bar pressure on Ceres for example, a mass of gas equivelent to 1% the mass of the asteroid would be required. Hence, there is likley to be an economic limit to terraforming, rather than a hard practical one.

The most obvious question is why any future civilisation would bother, when it is so much easier to construct a free floating habitat in space and tailor the interior to whatever conditions are required. Terraforming would probably cost more per unit surface area and the quality of the environment created would be questionable in most cases. Who would want to live on a world with a 14day night, or on a world whose surfcae temperature could not rise above freezing without becoming a global ocean? There is also a resource efficiency problem. If Ceres were deconstructed and used to produce free-floating space colonies, the materila could produce 1000 times the surfcae area of the Earth. If Ceres were terraformed, its surface area would be 150 times smaller than the Earth. That's a factor of 150,000 difference. The same would apply to the moon, which is far more valuable as a source of materials than as an actual habitable world in its own right.

m1omg · 2007-07-05 14:49:08

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface. It also seems to be valuable simply as a vacuum staging area for lots of industries. Subsurface colonies that utilize the deep interior heat might work though.
If the moon had a magnetic field strong enough to deflect the solar wind, then it is a fair bet that it would have retained a thick atmosphere to this day. A synthetic magnetic field, produced by a superconducting ring around the equator, would allow the moon to hold on to an atmophere indefinitely, for as long as the field was kept in place.
In fact, it is possible to terraform much smaller worlds than the moon, simply be providing a magnetic field strong enough to capture any escaping ions from the ionosphere. For very small worlds, the mass of gas required to produce a tollerable surface pressure becomes so large that the atmosphere would account for a significant fraction of the total mass of the body. To produce a 1 bar pressure on Ceres for example, a mass of gas equivelent to 1% the mass of the asteroid would be required. Hence, there is likley to be an economic limit to terraforming, rather than a hard practical one.
The most obvious question is why any future civilisation would bother, when it is so much easier to construct a free floating habitat in space and tailor the interior to whatever conditions are required. Terraforming would probably cost more per unit surface area and the quality of the environment created would be questionable in most cases. Who would want to live on a world with a 14day night, or on a world whose surfcae temperature could not rise above freezing without becoming a global ocean? There is also a resource efficiency problem. If Ceres were deconstructed and used to produce free-floating space colonies, the materila could produce 1000 times the surfcae area of the Earth. If Ceres were terraformed, its surface area would be 150 times smaller than the Earth. That's a factor of 150,000 difference. The same would apply to the moon, which is far more valuable as a source of materials than as an actual habitable world in its own right.

AFAIK the Moon was volatile poor so it failed to create iosphere which will protect the atmosphere in absence of the mag. field (our Earth had periods in which the magnetosphere was non existent) and so it lost it's atmosphere.

At least 0.1 bar atmosphere will protect itself with ionosphere.

And using this calculator; http://www.transhuman.talktalk.net/iw/Geosync.htm ; Ceres must be as cold as Pluto to regain atmosphere.

m1omg · 2007-07-05 14:56:11

That 300 years figure is AFAIK not true, because in Celestia ED it was shown that Moon had a thin atmosphere for a few billion years from volcanic primordeal gases.
The Moon's lack of atmosphere is mainly because the Moon was poor in gas and all volatiles from the beggining and because that thin atmosphere wasn't sufficient to entabilish ionosphere that will protect it - contrary to popular belief, the magnetic field is not required - as long there is a charged particle radiation blocking ionosphere.
The 300 year figure is just for thermal escape, it doesn't even take into account stripping by the solar wind
According to this calculator ; http://www.transhuman.talktalk.net/iw/Geosync.htm ;
The Moon is capable of retaing CO2 up to a temperature of 7 degress Celsius and oxygen up to -70 deg. Celsius so there will be a slight leak but neglible in the time of the human's civilization existence from it's beggining.
-70 Celsius doesn't meet the usual criteria of terraforming, and I'm sure you can appreciate how quickly billions of years would become hundreds since thermal escape is governed by a power law.
Crash some CO2 and water rich comets to it, seed it with Ceredian ice (it was recently shown to have more frozen water than is all supply of fresh water on Earth!), bring some microbes and you will have a paradise Moon.
I think you're being a little optimistic here, but I hope we both get to walk in lunar forests one day

But the thin atmosphere of young Moon was retained for a few byr even in the solar wind erosion and hot volcanic surface so hundred years for an escape of an Earthlike atmosphere seems incorrect to me.

m1omg · 2007-07-05 15:03:54

Tom Kalbfus,
Lots of heat for sure.
I wonder what would happen to the atmosphere of titan with wide scale files from introduced o2?
Might be a good thing that the water ice stays in frozen state on Titan.
Titan is an awesome place for a colony, with frozen water split as 02 and hydrogen, methane rain as inexhaustible fuel source and a thick atmosphere for radiation protection.
I would expect Titan to be a city like enclosed colony that is self sufficient almost immediately as its established.
Well any of the frozen satellites will have an atmosphere if heated, Europa, Callisto, Ganymede, and Titan. The first three would have atmospheres that consisted of water vapor. Some of that water vapor would leak into space only to be replaced by water vapor further evaporated from the liquid ocean below.
First thing that would happen over the airless icy Gallileans is that the icy surface would sublimate away, but the Moon's gravity would retain some of that water vapor for a time, the pressure would build up to the point where the icy surface can then melt rather than sublime. You'd have a moon with a liquid ocean under a water vapor atmosphere, probably surrounded by a perpetual layer of water clouds that are constantly raining toward the surface while water constantly evaporates from the ocean below.
In Titan's case, it has a largely nitrogen atmosphere. The nitrogen would escape to be gradually replace by water vapor and other gasses that were previously locked in the ice. What you'd have eventually is a "boiling moon". These moons can boil for quite some time, if they boil too much, the the atmosphere of water vapor would buld up and cease the ocean's boiling, if it rains too much or water escapes into space, the the pressure would drop and the oceans would begin boiling again.

Titan is big enough to hold it's atmosphere.

dryson · 2007-07-05 17:10:01

Although a good idea, terraforming the Moon would not be feasible. First the Moon has a very inactive central core, which is part of the process for a liveable atmosphere to be made artificially or naturally.

A more feasible appraoch would be to be facilities like is currently being built in Englang, I believe the project is called New Eden. What the project is is a combination Bio-Sphere/greenhouse.

What could be done on the Moon could be done two fold - One Earth soil
with all the microbes that make up fertile soil would be sent to the moon, where do to Photosynthesis the foliage planted in the soil brought from Earth would create condensation on the glass window or thick plexiglass
panels that would run into gutters where the water would then be collected and used to irrigate the foliage and other needs.

The second approach would be to have the same layout as above but instead of using Earth soil, Moon soil would be used. Although the result at first would be very dusty after a few light sprinklings of water to keep the dust down fertilizers could be added to enrich the Moon soil in an attempt to sustain the foliage.

A good way to test this affect is too find an old baseball diamond that has a dirt infield, drag the infield until the top layer is a dusty layer that when you walk on it, everytime you step will result in a small puff of dust or microsoil to gush from where your foot was placed.

RobertDyck · 2007-07-05 18:11:01

I would say terraforming the Moon is not a good idea. Never mind whether it can be done, it shouldn't be done. This is an airless world very close to the Earth, a highly developed settled planet with a giant thriving economy and a diverse biosphere. The Moon is needed for industrial processes that require vacuum and partial gravity, as well as interferometry telescopes that can image Earth size planets around other stars.

Similarly I would not terraform Mercury. That planet has a very slow day, very hot day side and very cold night side. It also has very high density; the reverse centrifuge of the solar accretion disk gave it a high proportion of metals. This combination will result in highly concentrated metal veins that can be mined. Mining can use the heat of the sun itself to smelt metals, and either heat or power through photovoltaics can power the mining operation itself. Terraforming would interfere in this intensive mining, so leave Mercury airless.

However, we can terraform Mars, Venus, Ganymede, and Callisto. I want more scientific data about Europa before touching it; it may have a liquid ocean capable of supporting a biosphere right now. Is there life under the ice? We don't know, will have to explore it to find out. But that means a total of Earth plus 4 other terraformed worlds; that's enough.

noosfractal · 2007-07-05 22:10:48

At least 0.1 bar atmosphere will protect itself with ionosphere.

Do you have any evidence for this statement? I'm quite interested in this area, so if you've seen any calculations, I'd appreciate a reference to them.

the thin atmosphere of young Moon was retained for a few byr

Again, what makes you think this is true?

terraforming the Moon would not be feasible. First the Moon has a very inactive central core, which is part of the process for a liveable atmosphere to be made artificially or naturally.

How does an "inactive central core" prevent the maintenance of a "liveable atmosphere" ?

I would say terraforming the Moon is not a good idea. Never mind whether it can be done, it shouldn't be done. This is an airless world very close to the Earth, a highly developed settled planet with a giant thriving economy and a diverse biosphere. The Moon is needed for industrial processes that require vacuum and partial gravity, as well as interferometry telescopes that can image Earth size planets around other stars.

But Earth is deep within a gravity well, and the vacuum and viewing conditions are better at L5. A terraformed moon would make a great base for exploiting the rest of the solar system.

Spatula · 2007-07-05 22:30:30

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface.
Feel free to intellectually cripple yourself with premature, ill-informed judgements - god knows you won't be in the minority - the rest of us will continue to examine the possibility until actual evidence rules it out, as if scientists.

Have fun figuring out how to import water, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur, and lots of other fun ingredients to this dead rock then. I'll stick with Mars and Venus for now, which have at least some of those in appreciable quantities to make it seem economically worthwhile. Jupiter's moons are a long-shot, but I see the possibility for them.

To terraform the Moon, the planetoid itself would contribute nothing to the effort except gravity, and not particularly good gravity in of itself. We'd have to build a colossal magnetic field to supplement it. Everything else we're just adding from other things. Tens of thousands of TNOs would have to contribute materials. This is quite an operation.

I'm going to agree with RobertDyck on this one. We have four other better candidates for terraforming. Earth's Moon has no distinguishing characteristic that gives it an advantage over devoting resources to terraforming these other worlds. But that's not to say it won't be colonized heavily and be a very important center for growth. Without an atmosphere we'll be able to build up many industries that require high thermal efficiency. It's close to a habitable world, it has useful mineral resources as-is, and it happens to be a good place to set up telescopes and communications systems to talk to all of the other worlds being colonized without atmospheric interference.

noosfractal · 2007-07-05 23:46:30

Have fun figuring out how to import water, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur, and lots of other fun ingredients to this dead rock then.

Thanks, I will.

I'll stick with Mars and Venus for now, which have at least some of those in appreciable quantities to make it seem economically worthwhile.

I agree that greater benefit (e.g., shirtsleeve living environment) can be obtained with partial terraforming at Mars more quickly and less expensively than at Luna, but there is a big difference between more expensive and not possible, particularly when you are talking about economic environments decades from now.

Earth's Moon has no distinguishing characteristic that gives it an advantage over devoting resources to terraforming these other worlds.

Lower gravity -> larger launch payload for same fuel + easier reentry

Incoming solar energy twice that of Mars (ignoring atmospheric reductions!)

High value-add tech from Earth at 1/10th the cost. What happens when you run out of spares for your Martian auto-fab? Or if the latest model auto-fab would let you make engines that double your asteroid mining efficiency, but Martian facilities can't justify the transport cost for at least another 10 years - meanwhile the Luna guys are eating your lunch.

Possibility of an export (He3 for fusion) to pay for terraforming.

it happens to be a good place to set up telescopes and communications systems to talk to all of the other worlds being colonized without atmospheric interference.

The Lagrange points (or even GEO) are much better for this - Luna has dust and vibration problems.

m1omg · 2007-07-06 04:20:31

Although a good idea, terraforming the Moon would not be feasible. First the Moon has a very inactive central core, which is part of the process for a liveable atmosphere to be made artificially or naturally.
A more feasible appraoch would be to be facilities like is currently being built in Englang, I believe the project is called New Eden. What the project is is a combination Bio-Sphere/greenhouse.

What could be done on the Moon could be done two fold - One Earth soil
with all the microbes that make up fertile soil would be sent to the moon, where do to Photosynthesis the foliage planted in the soil brought from Earth would create condensation on the glass window or thick plexiglass
panels that would run into gutters where the water would then be collected and used to irrigate the foliage and other needs.
The second approach would be to have the same layout as above but instead of using Earth soil, Moon soil would be used. Although the result at first would be very dusty after a few light sprinklings of water to keep the dust down fertilizers could be added to enrich the Moon soil in an attempt to sustain the foliage.
A good way to test this affect is too find an old baseball diamond that has a dirt infield, drag the infield until the top layer is a dusty layer that when you walk on it, everytime you step will result in a small puff of dust or microsoil to gush from where your foot was placed.

NO.If the Moon will have an ionosphere, no magnetic field would be needed.
EVEN EARTH WAS SOMETIMES W/O MAG. FIELD.

m1omg · 2007-07-06 04:21:19

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface.
Feel free to intellectually cripple yourself with premature, ill-informed judgements - god knows you won't be in the minority - the rest of us will continue to examine the possibility until actual evidence rules it out, as if scientists.
Have fun figuring out how to import water, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur, and lots of other fun ingredients to this dead rock then. I'll stick with Mars and Venus for now, which have at least some of those in appreciable quantities to make it seem economically worthwhile. Jupiter's moons are a long-shot, but I see the possibility for them.
To terraform the Moon, the planetoid itself would contribute nothing to the effort except gravity, and not particularly good gravity in of itself. We'd have to build a colossal magnetic field to supplement it. Everything else we're just adding from other things. Tens of thousands of TNOs would have to contribute materials. This is quite an operation.
I'm going to agree with RobertDyck on this one. We have four other better candidates for terraforming. Earth's Moon has no distinguishing characteristic that gives it an advantage over devoting resources to terraforming these other worlds. But that's not to say it won't be colonized heavily and be a very important center for growth. Without an atmosphere we'll be able to build up many industries that require high thermal efficiency. It's close to a habitable world, it has useful mineral resources as-is, and it happens to be a good place to set up telescopes and communications systems to talk to all of the other worlds being colonized without atmospheric interference.

Import them from Ceres.

m1omg · 2007-07-06 04:26:05

At least 0.1 bar atmosphere will protect itself with ionosphere.
Do you have any evidence for this statement? I'm quite interested in this area, so if you've seen any calculations, I'd appreciate a reference to them.
the thin atmosphere of young Moon was retained for a few byr
Again, what makes you think this is true?
terraforming the Moon would not be feasible. First the Moon has a very inactive central core, which is part of the process for a liveable atmosphere to be made artificially or naturally.
How does an "inactive central core" prevent the maintenance of a "liveable atmosphere" ?
I would say terraforming the Moon is not a good idea. Never mind whether it can be done, it shouldn't be done. This is an airless world very close to the Earth, a highly developed settled planet with a giant thriving economy and a diverse biosphere. The Moon is needed for industrial processes that require vacuum and partial gravity, as well as interferometry telescopes that can image Earth size planets around other stars.
But Earth is deep within a gravity well, and the vacuum and viewing conditions are better at L5. A terraformed moon would make a great base for exploiting the rest of the solar system.

1.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraformi … _radiation

"However, recent scientific evidence suggest that just a thick enough atmosphere like Earth's is enough to create a shielding effect in the absence of a magnetosphere. In the past, Earth regularly had periods where the magnetosphere changed direction and collapsed for some time. Some scientists believe that in the ionosphere, a magnetic shielding was created almost instantly after the magnetosphere collapsed.[3], a principle that applies to Venus as well and would also be the case in every other planet or moon with a large enough atmosphere."

2.Celestia ED simulation.

Antius · 2007-07-06 05:19:56

Forget it. The Moon's too small to be properly terraformed at the surface.
Feel free to intellectually cripple yourself with premature, ill-informed judgements - god knows you won't be in the minority - the rest of us will continue to examine the possibility until actual evidence rules it out, as if scientists.
Have fun figuring out how to import water, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur, and lots of other fun ingredients to this dead rock then. I'll stick with Mars and Venus for now, which have at least some of those in appreciable quantities to make it seem economically worthwhile. Jupiter's moons are a long-shot, but I see the possibility for them.
To terraform the Moon, the planetoid itself would contribute nothing to the effort except gravity, and not particularly good gravity in of itself. We'd have to build a colossal magnetic field to supplement it. Everything else we're just adding from other things. Tens of thousands of TNOs would have to contribute materials. This is quite an operation.
I'm going to agree with RobertDyck on this one. We have four other better candidates for terraforming. Earth's Moon has no distinguishing characteristic that gives it an advantage over devoting resources to terraforming these other worlds. But that's not to say it won't be colonized heavily and be a very important center for growth. Without an atmosphere we'll be able to build up many industries that require high thermal efficiency. It's close to a habitable world, it has useful mineral resources as-is, and it happens to be a good place to set up telescopes and communications systems to talk to all of the other worlds being colonized without atmospheric interference.

Most of the mass of the atmosphere could come from the moon, as could 90% of the mass of the water needed to produce an active hydrosphere.

A lunar atmosphere consisting of 90% pure oxygen and perhaps 10% water vapour at 1/3rd bar, would produce the same O2 concentration in human blood as Earth's atmosphere. Only trace amounts of nitrogen would actually be needed.

Getting enough water/hydrogen to the moon to fill the lunar mare may present a significant problem, given that we would probably need about a million cubic kilometres to fill the mare to a depth of 80m. Thats an iceteroid of diametre 120km - a very sizable TNO.

Soil minerals, phosphorus and nitrogen would be needed in relatively small quantities (~10s millions of tonnes) and would presumably be available in the asteroid belt, in addition to what already exists in lunar regolith.

noosfractal · 2007-07-06 05:58:04

At least 0.1 bar atmosphere will protect itself with ionosphere.
Do you have any evidence for this statement? I'm quite interested in this area, so if you've seen any calculations, I'd appreciate a reference to them.

1.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraformi … _radiation
"However, recent scientific evidence suggest that just a thick enough atmosphere like Earth's is enough to create a shielding effect in the absence of a magnetosphere. In the past, Earth regularly had periods where the magnetosphere changed direction and collapsed for some time. Some scientists believe that in the ionosphere, a magnetic shielding was created almost instantly after the magnetosphere collapsed.[3], a principle that applies to Venus as well and would also be the case in every other planet or moon with a large enough atmosphere."

So I believe the ionosphere can provide the surface with radiation shielding even in the absence of a magnetic field, but I don't believe that the ionosphere can prevent itself being blown away by the solar wind in this situation.

the thin atmosphere of young Moon was retained for a few byr

Again, what makes you think this is true?

2.Celestia ED simulation.

Is Celestia ED something different from Celestia? If not, then I don't believe that it models atmospheric evolution.

I believe the Moon had at atmosphere that was constantly replenished by volcanic activity for billions of years, but once the volcanic activity stopped, the atmosphere blew away in the solar wind (there are still traces left).

m1omg · 2007-07-06 06:00:45

At least 0.1 bar atmosphere will protect itself with ionosphere.
Do you have any evidence for this statement? I'm quite interested in this area, so if you've seen any calculations, I'd appreciate a reference to them.
1.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraformi … _radiation
"However, recent scientific evidence suggest that just a thick enough atmosphere like Earth's is enough to create a shielding effect in the absence of a magnetosphere. In the past, Earth regularly had periods where the magnetosphere changed direction and collapsed for some time. Some scientists believe that in the ionosphere, a magnetic shielding was created almost instantly after the magnetosphere collapsed.[3], a principle that applies to Venus as well and would also be the case in every other planet or moon with a large enough atmosphere."
So I believe the ionosphere can provide the surface with radiation shielding even in the absence of a magnetic field, but I don't believe that the ionosphere can prevent itself being blown away by the solar wind in this situation.
the thin atmosphere of young Moon was retained for a few byr
Again, what makes you think this is true?
2.Celestia ED simulation.
Is Celestia ED something different from Celestia? If not, then I don't believe that it models atmospheric evolution.
I believe the Moon had at atmosphere that was constantly replenished by volcanic activity for billions of years, but once the volcanic activity stopped, the atmosphere blew away in the solar wind (there are still traces left).

Celestia ED is educational version of Celestia.
It shows the evolution of the Earth and Moon, stars and so on.

noosfractal · 2007-07-06 06:13:50

Import them from Ceres.

Ceres could be a great source of water with its 100 km thick blanket of ice.

Spatula · 2007-07-06 13:56:34

Most of the mass of the atmosphere could come from the moon, as could 90% of the mass of the water needed to produce an active hydrosphere.
A lunar atmosphere consisting of 90% pure oxygen and perhaps 10% water vapour at 1/3rd bar, would produce the same O2 concentration in human blood as Earth's atmosphere. Only trace amounts of nitrogen would actually be needed.

Don't forget that under 1/6th earth gravity, it would take an atmosphere twice as dense as Earth's to create 1/3rd pressure at the Moon's surface.

If, at any point, we have to rely on industrial refining to get something, such as chemically extracting components from the moon's crust, we might as well give up. This would be an impossibly expensive step to conduct on a planetary scale. Getting stuff like Oxygen without refining would be insurmountable.

The best thing I can think of is genetically engineering a very sturdy type of bacteria to pull it out of the minerals in the crust.

I'm not saying it's impossible to terraform the Moon. I'm saying that for the cost, it's not worth it.

m1omg · 2007-07-06 15:21:55

Most of the mass of the atmosphere could come from the moon, as could 90% of the mass of the water needed to produce an active hydrosphere.
A lunar atmosphere consisting of 90% pure oxygen and perhaps 10% water vapour at 1/3rd bar, would produce the same O2 concentration in human blood as Earth's atmosphere. Only trace amounts of nitrogen would actually be needed.
Don't forget that under 1/6th earth gravity, it would take an atmosphere twice as dense as Earth's to create 1/3rd pressure at the Moon's surface.
If, at any point, we have to rely on industrial refining to get something, such as chemically extracting components from the moon's crust, we might as well give up. This would be an impossibly expensive step to conduct on a planetary scale. Getting stuff like Oxygen without refining would be insurmountable.
The best thing I can think of is genetically engineering a very sturdy type of bacteria to pull it out of the minerals in the crust.
I'm not saying it's impossible to terraform the Moon. I'm saying that for the cost, it's not worth it.

If you will have more partial pressure of the oxygen in that atmosphere you will not need so much pressure.
It will be done, sometimes.

Mark Friedenbach · 2007-07-06 16:24:51

If, at any point, we have to rely on industrial refining to get something, such as chemically extracting components from the moon's crust, we might as well give up. This would be an impossibly expensive step to conduct on a planetary scale. Getting stuff like Oxygen without refining would be insurmountable.

1. Mix hydrogen into regolith.
2. Heat to 600C.
3. Collect out gassing water.
4. Split H2O to recover original hydrogen. O2 is a byproduct.

Repeat as necessary. Link.

noosfractal · 2007-07-06 18:09:05

The best thing I can think of is genetically engineering a very sturdy type of bacteria to pull it out of the minerals in the crust.

You'll likely still have to bootstrap using industrial processes or Ceres/iceteroids to get to the point where extremophiles can take over.

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