Is Elon Musk Right? Should We Nuke Mars?
Elon Musk’s plan to nuke the poles of Mars to transform it into a new Earth seems totally insane, but could it actually work?
Elon Musk is a divisive man. To some, he is a visionary, to others he is out of his depth. But even if you are a devout follower of Musk, you have to admit that when he declared last August that we should ‘Nuke Mars!’ to terraform it into a habitable Earth-like planet it was his most outlandish, if not bizarre idea yet! But is this the ravings of a madman or an ingenious shot at interplanetary colonisation?
Firstly, how would nuking Mars transform it from a desolate cold planet with a thin atmosphere to a second Earth?
Well, luckily Musk has since elaborated on what he means. He wants to detonate nuclear devices on Mars’s poles, vaporising its’ frozen ice caps, releasing a colossal amount of water vapour and CO² into the Martian atmosphere. This will cause a runaway greenhouse effect. As the temperature rises due to the greenhouse gasses released by the explosions, the Martian rocks will heat up and outgas more CO², which heats the planet more, releasing more CO² and so on.
This would lead to a world that has a temperature similar to Earth, with a much thicker atmosphere and liquid water. All…
