New Mars Forums

Like you say, I think it depends on what the crater is made of, and maybe also how big the crater is.  There are craters on Earth that have survived millions of years of weathering. 

But in the context of domed craters, I've been wondering if they really provide that much benefit.  Maybe there'll be water pooled at the bottom of the crater, maybe you can bury your habits more easily. 

But I've been thinking about dome construction, and I'm not sure that putting up a dome in a crater has any great benefit, and it may just mean that one of your first jobs is to build a road out of the crater.  Blah.

Researchers develop inexpensive, easy process to produce solar panels
http://www.physorg.com/news103997338.html

“The process is simple,” said lead researcher and author Somenath Mitra, PhD, professor and acting chair of NJIT’s Department ofChemistry and Environmental Sciences. “Someday homeowners will even be able to print sheets of these solar cells with inexpensive home-based inkjet printers. Consumers can then slap the finished product on a wall, roof or billboard to create their own power stations.”

Sounds really cool.  I'll look forward to hearing more about it.

I wonder what tech we'll have by 2300.

I think the character of terraforming changes pre and post colonization.  In particular, pre-colonization terraforming can be rapid and high energy (e.g., ammonia asteroid impacts), whereas post-colonization terraforming is likely constrained to gradual, relatively low energy techniques (e.g., solar mirrors, PFC factories).  The creation of oceans/liquid surface water seems to be another major event.  Even if it is gradual, if it occurs post-colonization, it is going to be a source of major challenges – think of the melting permafrost on Earth but multiplied a hundred times.

I think the question of how terraforming is funded is interesting.  I imagine there is an Earth-based terraforming fund.  Assume it starts at a certain amount and has a baseline annual donation and then additional donations based on perceived results.  The player can spend the fund capital or limit themselves to spending just the interest – or spend nothing and wait for the fund to grow in anticipation of higher interest only spending later (at the cost of results-based donations).  Post-colonization, the colonists can tax themselves or simply rely on donations for the common good.  I’d like to see that dynamic emerge naturally – perhaps different colonies can earn social standing or tech levels for terraforming donations.  Construction of a space elevator for Mars is probably another project at this level – or else probably a game winning advantage for a single colony.

I certainly think there should be multiple colonies with differing tech, culture, and so on.  I love to see a natural market emerging between the colonies.  You can buy anything from Earth but at high cost, but it is almost always going to be better to buy local if someone has a surplus.  Colonies would compete with each other for immigrants (from Earth and from each other).  Quality of life stats/score could help determine this for each colony.  This is where the gain or loss of particular individuals could really make a difference to a colony.

That is interesting!

I think Phobos gets more attention because of its similarity to C-type asteroids.  We have a lot to learn about this class of asteroids and they could be very useful as a source of raw materials.

Hi Midoshi, great first post    I'll second Rick's welcome and I'd also love to see what numbers you've come up with for permafrost dynamics. 

Maybe you also have some comments in the context of microterraforming where we would try to create plant-friendly conditions in just one (say 10 km diameter) domed crater.

Seashore mallow seen as biodiesel source
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070710/ap_ … e_mallow_2

Here is a crop for the bogs if they are salty

I haven't seen much discussion on this next stage of terraforming, so people are probably just still thinking about it.

Let me try to put together a terraforming timeline, and see where bogification fits in ...

Year 0: decision to terraform
Year 10: insolation mirrors go online
Year 15: PFC factories go online
Year 35: polar CO2 sublimates
Year 45: 300 mbars of CO2
Year 50: liquid water on Mars (mean global temp. > 0C)
Year 55-70: oceans form
Year 75: first ammonia asteroid outgas
Year 80: first Dyckian bogs (N2/O2 pressure ~0.2 mbars)
Year 90: first blue-sky harvest

what do you think?

Sounds fantastic to be able to produce usable soil in just a few years.

Some people have worried, for example, that iron concentrations might be too high, so that we might have to go through a rather more involved process to create topsoil.  Have you read anything about that?

The idea is that the carbon would react as completely as possible during impact.  As you say, anything left over is of only small benefit. 

The shape, size and velocity of the "bullets" would be chosen to maximize the reaction.  In particular, the bullet would be pre-stresses to fracture into multiple pieces on impact to maximize reaction surface area.  Also, if a straight shot didn't give high enough velocity, the bullet could be shot "up" from the equatorially orbiting moon and then arc back down towards the pole at up to 5000 m/sec. 

At 3000 m/sec each tonne of carbon would have a kinetic energy equivalent to a tonne of TNT (~4.2 GJ).  That's enough to turn 100 tonnes of ice to steam or raise the temperature of 10 tonnes of ice to several thousand degrees.  At those temperatures there will be plenty of free oxygen and hydrogen around for the carbon to react with, however, maximizing the reaction rate will require quite a bit of study.

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

I guess we'll have to disagree on that point.