What Would it Take To Make Mars Look Like Earth?
All plans to make Mars like Earth (terraforming), using today's technology, will take centuries or millennia and end up with extremely poor results. Terraforming Mars, the book, looks at this challenge from a fresh perspective. Using technology which does not yet exist, the book attempts to answer the question: Is terraforming Mars even possible?
Terraforming Mars: Remaking the Red Planet, Ready for Life, starts with the primary challenge—the missing Martian magnetosphere. Three options are discussed.
Then, the book introduces some fundamental science involving the second challenge—how much air Mars should receive, and from where. Five scenarios are studied to find the "just right" amount for long-term habitability.
Next on the Terraforming Mars shopping list, we look into the challenge of getting sufficient water to the Red Planet. This is followed by an overview of the Biosphere Phase of the project, looking at some of the details we will need to solve.
And finally, we look more deeply into the challenge of building up the Martian oceans, determining which of six scenarios gives us the best trade-offs in costs and benefits.
Once we have a Blue Mars, we look at what life will be like on the formerly red world.
The appendix includes all of the usual stuff—references, notes and glossary, but includes the full-color bonus: the Blue Mars Atlas sixteen maps of what the new planet Mars will look like with complete oceans, and a thick, breathable atmosphere.
