Terraforming mars in a short time

(Parallax) wrote in
m:
Might it be possible to raise the surface temp and atmospheric density
enough to make it easier for ppl to live there when astronauts get
there in 15-20 yrs? I dont expect to see this happen cuz ppl think
nukes are too scary but I was just wondering.


Assuming you have the ability to redirect an arbitrarily huge amount of icy
meteors/comets to mars. (we dont, by many MANY magnitudes, but never mind
for now).

Heating the place up is no problem. Incoming cometary material will posess
enough kinetic energy to heat itself to many thousands of degrees. As we
will need to dump trillions of tons of comets to form any real atmosphere,
the problem will most definitely be excess heat, not cold.

i.e.
Terraforming mars by dumping comets on it will work fine if you are willing
to move an *obscene* amount of comets, and do it over many years. Centuries
if not millenia. There is no way to speed this method up.

A *slightly* easier method would be to trigger as much deep seismic
activity as possible, use vulcanism to release the needed gasses. Problem
here is again the scale of energy needed. Mars has been kinda inactive for
a loooong time, the molten stuff is way deeper than on earth.(1500 km down,
compared to earth's 30-50km)

I think it would not be necessary to terraform the entire planet, if the
Mariner Valley is indeed deep enough and able to hold in most of what's put in
it, it has enough area inside by istelf to be quite enough living space to hold
plenty of generations of colonists.
What are the physics of this? How much "leakage" would have to be overcome?
Would it have to be "roofed over" to hold in enough pressure?