The Catholic Church?
Terraforming Venus' Atmosphere
- Thread starter All Seeing Eye
- Start date
The Catholic Church?
I keep thinking about terraforming Venus, and the question I keeping coming around to is this -- why?
If humanity has the technology to build stationary sun shades and spin-up the planet and drive comets into the planet to modify the atmosphere, etc., then humanity doesn't need to terraform Venus. We'd already have space habs and colonies on the Moon, Mars, and the asteroids.
If humanity has the technology to build stationary sun shades and spin-up the planet and drive comets into the planet to modify the atmosphere, etc., then humanity doesn't need to terraform Venus. We'd already have space habs and colonies on the Moon, Mars, and the asteroids.
Because it is there.
I said the exact same thing in another thread. The answer was that humans need lots of dirt underneath them. Apparently.
Correct me if wrong, since I don't know, but doersn't Venus not have a ozone, right? Wouldn't all that oxygen just fly out into space?
One of the ideas of averting asteriods is giving them small nudges years before (with precise calculations) so they eventually vere off course. With some powerful rockets on positions on Venus' surface, couldn't we "nudge" it enough so that given a few years it enter's an orbit closer to the sun? Maybe on the opposite side of Earth's orbit so it doesn't block out the sun, that way it has the general same temperatures.
Wouldn't that also make terraforming it easier?
One of the ideas of averting asteriods is giving them small nudges years before (with precise calculations) so they eventually vere off course. With some powerful rockets on positions on Venus' surface, couldn't we "nudge" it enough so that given a few years it enter's an orbit closer to the sun? Maybe on the opposite side of Earth's orbit so it doesn't block out the sun, that way it has the general same temperatures.
Wouldn't that also make terraforming it easier?
The ozone has nothing to do with holding oxygen in. Gravity does that. The ozone blocks harmful UV radiation. Our own planet has a good sized hole, which is getting bigger, but it's not effecting oxygen levels.
As for your rocket idea, With all the massive explosions, rocket tests, and the like on our own planet, has it nudged us at all. Does anyone have any info on that?
Another proposal I've read was basically a space mirror would be used to block the light of the sun hitting Venus, allowing the atmosphere to cool down naturally - a lot of the gases would just freeze to the surface making their eventual storage/removal much easier.
Once the atmosphere has thinned out sufficiently, take the mirror away, or adjust it so that it lets a a certain level of light through and away you go. Much easier to adjust the make up of the atmosphere once you've dealt with the greenhouse effect.
Get the atmosphere thinned out so that it's possible to work and install equipment on the surface then you can regulate what gases are returned to the atmosphere once the mirror is removed.
It would be a long process - probably take a couple of centuries but maintaining a space mirror is much easier than maintaining atmosphere scrubber on lethal surface.
Once the atmosphere has thinned out sufficiently, take the mirror away, or adjust it so that it lets a a certain level of light through and away you go. Much easier to adjust the make up of the atmosphere once you've dealt with the greenhouse effect.
Get the atmosphere thinned out so that it's possible to work and install equipment on the surface then you can regulate what gases are returned to the atmosphere once the mirror is removed.
It would be a long process - probably take a couple of centuries but maintaining a space mirror is much easier than maintaining atmosphere scrubber on lethal surface.
Obviously, then, what we need is a new religion.
Let's call it the "Temple of Venus."
Its doctrine is that Venus was once Paradise. But then humanity sinned, and was driven out of this Paradise, whose gates were locked against us.
Our goal as a species is to atone for our sin, by working together to complete the project of terraforming Venus--that is to say, the project of re-opening the gates of Paradise.
After that, everything will be perfect once again.
Can I get an "amen"?
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No, we couldn't.
How many millions of square miles must the area of such a mirror be?
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Varies based on technique used. More here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraforming_of_Venus#Solar_Shades
One method would require the size of the shade would be four times the diameter of Venus itself if at the L1 point.
It wouldn't need to be thicker than a sheet o foil. You'd need some sort of drive to counteract the pressure of the solar wind on the shade as well.
Certainly a big engineering project - but we're talking about transforming the atmosphere of an entire planet - everything is big!
All Seeing Eye
Admiral
I'm still not getting why we need to speed it up or slam comets into it. The planet is liveable with it's current spin, when people are living on the night side they can take vitamin D supplements in response to the lack of sun it's only 9 months if even that. We don't need comets neither, my idea would work far quicker and easier, especially the floating/orbital extractors.
Everybody seems to want to go around the houses instead of taking the quickest most easiest approach and something we could start now with enough money.
Not really. Humans may be able to cope psychologically, but what of the flora and fauna that we would have to import to Venus? The diurnal cycle is hard-wired into the genes of virtually everything here on Earth; you can't uproot flora and fauna to a planet where 2 months are spent in darkness.
Comets are an easy way to introduce water (and thus, hydrogen) to Venus. Which will help to transform the atmosphere into something less than hellish.
The problem is that if you have the space engineering infrastructure in place to build sunshades or solar blinders, then you have the space engineering infrastructure to colonize the Moon, Mars, the asteroid belt, and the moons of the outer solar system. You don't need Venus.
Thinking long-term, this is what I would do...
Establish a lunar colony. Build a mass driver on the surface. Fire cannisters of algae from the moon toward Venus. Over a period of years, seed the upper atmosphere of Venus with algae. If possible, divert near-Earth comets toward Venus to introduce water and hydrogen into the atmosphere. It's a long-term, lower tech solution.
All Seeing Eye
Admiral
Surely if we have the capability to hunt down comets and alter their course with expert precision we would also have the ability to take a trip to Jupiter and take some Hydrogen from there and use it to create the water on Venus.
You'd get more hydrogen out of a single comet than you would by diving Jupiter's atmosphere.
Think about what you're talking about. You're talking about a ship that needs to be sturdy enough to dive Jupiter's atmosphere, shielded enough that Jupiter's magnetic field doesn't play havoc with its systems, and then get that ship, now laden with hydrogen (that you've probably compressed) out of Jupiter's gravity well.
I'm standing by my idea that it's going to be easier to find comets in local space and nudge them into Venus-intercept orbits with low-yield nukes.
Think about what you're talking about. You're talking about a ship that needs to be sturdy enough to dive Jupiter's atmosphere, shielded enough that Jupiter's magnetic field doesn't play havoc with its systems, and then get that ship, now laden with hydrogen (that you've probably compressed) out of Jupiter's gravity well.
I'm standing by my idea that it's going to be easier to find comets in local space and nudge them into Venus-intercept orbits with low-yield nukes.
All Seeing Eye
Admiral
How strong is Jupiters gravity near the top of its atmosphere? how about using a similar system to the one I proposed for cleaning Venus' atmosphere. An orbital platform that uses flexible piping (maybe carbon nanotube even) that drops into the Hydrogen clouds and uses floating extractors to pump up the gas. The platform in orbit could use some of the Hydrogen extracted as fuel to keep it in place.
The Hydrogen is then shipped to Venus in large tankers either by a self propelling craft or it can be slung towards Venus to be recaptured on arrival.
Even if Jupiter proves difficult with its size and gravity, there's always Uranus and Neptune which are smaller.
The Hydrogen is then shipped to Venus in large tankers either by a self propelling craft or it can be slung towards Venus to be recaptured on arrival.
Even if Jupiter proves difficult with its size and gravity, there's always Uranus and Neptune which are smaller.
ETA: Crap! This is confusing - I just relaized that there are two different threads on the *same* topic!!! http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?t=83284
NM - the rest deleted by me.
NM - the rest deleted by me.
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All Seeing Eye
Admiral
The last post before yours was made December 15 2008, you've resurrected a 3 month old thread.
*doh*
I must have followed your link then just completely forgot I did that somehow...
Man...I guess I gotta lay of the Romulan ale.
I tell ya, that stuff should be illegal!
i like both ideas maybe we could use them all! sady we never live to see the work done even if we sart by 2020. it will take 100s of year to see it done
A
Amaris
Guest
A solution might be to discover the vibration frequency of the CO2 molecules and eliminate it that way.
J.
J.
