Terraforming

Why Mars is a waste of money...

There's been a lot of talk about Mars recently. The pathfinder mission has led to talks of, perhaps, a manned (or womanned) mission. If this happens there will then possibly be a move to colonize and/or terraform the planet. This is a bad idea.

Mars is colder than a witch's tit not because it's further away from the sun, but because it has no insulating atmosphere. (The exact opposite is true of Venus... but we'll get to that later) The solution, it seems, is simple: thicken the atmosphere. This would be relatively easy at first: a matter of melting the polar "ice" caps. (the Martian "ice" caps are actually made of a hefty portion of solid CO₂ or "dry ice") After that, gases would have to be imported, most likely from the mining of A) the moons B) the asteroids.

The problem with this answer is that Mars has a shallow gravity well. Mars simply is not massive enough to maintain a heavy envelope of gas. Any atmosphere that is established on the planet will slowly bleed off into space with nominal help from the solar wind.

My Suggestion..

Venus is a much better choice if we're planning on terraforming anything. First, Venus does have enough mass to harbor a breathable atmosphere. In fact Venus has a mass approximately equal to Earth. Second, Venus is closer than Mars= less travel time. 3rd, Venus is an inner planet allowing for the use of the Solar gravity well in astrogation (= less travel time) and a faster revolution rate. (= more frequent windows for trips)

The most obvious drawback to Venus is that it's hot enough to boil a monkey's bum. Venus is a victim of a "runaway greenhouse effect." Earth could have also possibly run the same course if, at some point during the precambrian, the majority of the carbon in the atmosphere hadn't precipitated out. (it turned into China by the way... the country, not the little plates)

How do we solve this? I'd expect dumping a few billion tons of a calcium carbonate catalyst would cause a hefty portion of the CO₂ to react out. After this the planet would begin to cool. Colonization could begin at the poles and work towards the equator.

Venus is also a better choice from a financial standpoint. In addition to the savings simply from the ease of getting there and back (Shorter, Faster, More Frequent Trips) Venus holds a massive metallic wealth. The combination of a hot environment and an oxygen free atmosphere has led to the deposit of fairly pure metals on the surface. It wouldn't surprise me to find them arranged by order of melting point, those with the lowest closest to the poles.

Of course we should probably get to the point where we can stop worrying about this planet before we start worrying about others...