Author Topic: Increasing Mars' atmosphere with magnetic field @ Sun-Mars L1  (Read 23320 times)

Offline JasonAW3

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2443
  • Claremore, Ok.
  • Liked: 410
  • Likes Given: 14
A few basic questions here;

      1. What strength of magnetic field would be needed to LARGELY eliminate atmospheric erosion by solar winda and coronal mass ejections?

      2. Assuming that it would be significantly less than that that is required for Earth, (radiation reduction rules would likely be in effect.  Radiation levels are reduced by the square of the distance from the source of radiation) how much power would be required to produce such a field effect?

      3. Utilizing high temperature superconducting ribbons, wrapped around the planet to produce such a field, could fields of solar panels produce enough power to produce such a field?  (Don't balk at this; producing such lengths of superconducting ribbon is possible, although likely at a lower rate than we do for conventional wire, but it is possible).

      4. Are the materials needed to produce such lengths of superconducting wire available on Mars, or would extraction from asteroids be needed?

      Obviously the above questions are fanciful speculation, but I suspect that such a system would be less expensive, more practical and less prone to failure than an L1 based magnetic shield.

      Not that I am faulting the initial reasoning, but an enveloping Magnetic Field would likely be FAR more effective that one protecting a planet from only one side.  Besides, you'd still have some spillage from around the edges of such a shield that would still affect the planet, unless you made the shield many times the diameter of Mars itself.
My God!  It's full of universes!

Offline meekGee

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 14158
  • N. California
  • Liked: 14046
  • Likes Given: 1392
A few basic questions here;

      1. What strength of magnetic field would be needed to LARGELY eliminate atmospheric erosion by solar winda and coronal mass ejections?

      2. Assuming that it would be significantly less than that that is required for Earth, (radiation reduction rules would likely be in effect.  Radiation levels are reduced by the square of the distance from the source of radiation) how much power would be required to produce such a field effect?

      3. Utilizing high temperature superconducting ribbons, wrapped around the planet to produce such a field, could fields of solar panels produce enough power to produce such a field?  (Don't balk at this; producing such lengths of superconducting ribbon is possible, although likely at a lower rate than we do for conventional wire, but it is possible).

      4. Are the materials needed to produce such lengths of superconducting wire available on Mars, or would extraction from asteroids be needed?

      Obviously the above questions are fanciful speculation, but I suspect that such a system would be less expensive, more practical and less prone to failure than an L1 based magnetic shield.

      Not that I am faulting the initial reasoning, but an enveloping Magnetic Field would likely be FAR more effective that one protecting a planet from only one side.  Besides, you'd still have some spillage from around the edges of such a shield that would still affect the planet, unless you made the shield many times the diameter of Mars itself.

They worked it out to be only 1-2 Tesla.

The reason it is so small (IMO) is the fact that you're creating such a long magneto bubble, instead of a round one.  You only need to deflect those particles by a tiny amount at those distances, and they'll miss the planet.

I think if you try to do it right around the planet, you'll need to create a much higher magnetic field.

I am very uncertain about the BoE calculations above.  Magnetic fields behave in all sorts of unexpected ways.  Maybe this trick is very much feasible.  The thing is - the current atmospheric mass loss rates seem to be out of whack - something I'm sure hasn't escaped the proposal's authors' attention.

If there's meat to it, it's interesting enough that there will be a follow up
ABCD - Always Be Counting Down

Offline JasonAW3

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2443
  • Claremore, Ok.
  • Liked: 410
  • Likes Given: 14
Are we talking too high a loss or too low?

      If too.high, it could be some atmospheric "fixing" mechanism at work.  If too low, could be someting causing a release of "fixed" atmospheric components from the soil.  Either way, something weird is going on.

      I also wonder i the "water releases" could be qn odd combinatin of atmospheric chemicals either  in solution or as a weird low temperature liquid that may be being broken down by the high UV at surface level.
My God!  It's full of universes!

Offline Stormbringer

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1340
  • Liked: 239
  • Likes Given: 92
wait... it is my understanding that if you somehow returned Mars' atmosphere such that it had the Earth's distribution of gases and density and then did nothing to retain it in place it would still take a period of time longer than human kind has existed for it to erode/devolve again to it's present state. That's a heck of a long time. Plenty of time for civilizations to rise and fall and even for species to rise and fall. So i don't get it...Why exactly do we need an artificial magnetic field except for the sake of OCD completionists?
When antigravity is outlawed only outlaws will have antigravity.

Offline JasonAW3

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2443
  • Claremore, Ok.
  • Liked: 410
  • Likes Given: 14
wait... it is my understanding that if you somehow returned Mars' atmosphere such that it had the Earth's distribution of gases and density and then did nothing to retain it in place it would still take a period of time longer than human kind has existed for it to erode/devolve again to it's present state. That's a heck of a long time. Plenty of time for civilizations to rise and fall and even for species to rise and fall. So i don't get it...Why exactly do we need an artificial magnetic field except for the sake of OCD completionists?

Ok, this is pretty simple, at least n the face of it.

      Restoring the pressure to hear Earth levels will be difficult enough and take at least a century or more, even without the constant erosion of the atmosphere as it I now.  With the addition of the solar winds eroding what little atmosphere there is now, in addition to what is extracted from the soil and rocks, the task would likely be extended to millennia, if not made impossible all together.

      Even assuming that one could speed the process by dropping every stray comet and wet asteroid that you could, (and that's a LOT of Delta v needed for that) it really wouldn't speed the process much without limiting the atmospheric erosion from the solar winds.
My God!  It's full of universes!

Offline Stormbringer

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1340
  • Liked: 239
  • Likes Given: 92
bear with me here as i have dropped a few digits of memory precision on this; but I have read that the time for erosion from Earth-like levels of atmosphere for Mars from all sources of erosion and other factors like chemical sequestration and things like that is either 300 million years or else 300 thousand years from the time Mars' dynamism ended. Either way it's more time than humanity or human civilization or recorded history has existed.

When antigravity is outlawed only outlaws will have antigravity.

Offline RonM

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3340
  • Atlanta, Georgia USA
  • Liked: 2231
  • Likes Given: 1584
bear with me here as i have dropped a few digits of memory precision on this; but I have read that the time for erosion from Earth-like levels of atmosphere for Mars from all sources of erosion and other factors like chemical sequestration and things like that is either 300 million years or else 300 thousand years from the time Mars' dynamism ended. Either way it's more time than humanity or human civilization or recorded history has existed.

Once you have an Earth-like atmosphere it will take a long time for it to erode, but first you have to create that atmosphere. Reducing erosion will make it easier to build up the atmosphere.

Offline ppnl

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 312
  • Liked: 208
  • Likes Given: 19
bear with me here as i have dropped a few digits of memory precision on this; but I have read that the time for erosion from Earth-like levels of atmosphere for Mars from all sources of erosion and other factors like chemical sequestration and things like that is either 300 million years or else 300 thousand years from the time Mars' dynamism ended. Either way it's more time than humanity or human civilization or recorded history has existed.

Once you have an Earth-like atmosphere it will take a long time for it to erode, but first you have to create that atmosphere. Reducing erosion will make it easier to build up the atmosphere.

Mars is losing atmosphere at  a rate of about 0.25 pounds per second. If you can't add atmosphere many orders of magnitude faster than this then you may as well not bother. If you can then the loss rate is a very distant secondary consideration.

I have seen some estimates that the Earth is losing atmospheric mass ten times as fast as Mars.

I really don't think they have all the science settled yet.

Offline Rei

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 540
  • Iceland
  • Liked: 332
  • Likes Given: 161
bear with me here

GrrrrrRRrrrr! Raaaaahhrrr!!!   *mauls a camper*

(sorry, I couldn't help myself  ;)  )

Offline Stormbringer

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1340
  • Liked: 239
  • Likes Given: 92
(Whew!)

https://phys.org/news/2017-12-mars-atmosphere-solar.html

The solar wind does not increase erosion of the atmosphere significantly. it does increase the velocity of atoms or ions already escaped.

Quote
"Despite stronger solar wind and EUV-radiation levels under the early Sun, ion escape can not explain more than 0.006 bar of atmospheric pressure lost over the course of 3.9 billion years," says Robin Ramstad. "Even our upper estimate, 0.01 bar, is an insignificant amount in comparison to the atmosphere required to maintain a sufficiently strong greenhouse effect, about 1 bar or more according to climate models."

The results presented in the thesis show that a stronger solar wind mainly accelerates particles already escaping the planet's gravity, but does not increase the ion escape rate. Contrary to previous assumptions, the induced magnetosphere is also shown to protect the bulk of the Martian ionosphere from solar wind energy transfer.


Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-12-mars-atmosphere-solar.html#jCp
« Last Edit: 12/09/2017 02:21 pm by Stormbringer »
When antigravity is outlawed only outlaws will have antigravity.

Tags:
 

Advertisement NovaTech
Advertisement Northrop Grumman
Advertisement
Advertisement Margaritaville Beach Resort South Padre Island
Advertisement Brady Kenniston
Advertisement NextSpaceflight
Advertisement Nathan Barker Photography
1