Worldbuilding

Questions tagged [terraforming]

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For questions about the process of turning a barren space (such as a planet, moon, or asteroid) into a habitable one.

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Which place in our solar system is the most fit for terraforming?

Far in the future technology has evolved to the point that humanity is able to try and terraform something in our solar system. The moon is out, since it's too close to earth and therefore to risky, ...
6
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1answer
81 views

Time to cool a de-atmosphered Venus?

The surface of Venus is about 492ºC, under a sky containing 92 atmospheres of mostly carbon dioxide, and it probably has been for many millions of years. This means the entirety of the planet's 50 km ...
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4answers
153 views

How big an area can we possibly make habitable on the moon?

This question focuses on an artificial atmosphere on the moon and the achieved amount being the limiting factor for the size of habitats. I got a lot of beef for the suggestion to terraform the whole ...
3
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2answers
111 views

Would this setup of a terraformed moon hold up?

[Edits added in italic] BACKGROUND A few thousand years from now the moon has become one of many habitable places in the solar system. Economy, constant growing knowledge and human will made drastic ...
3
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2answers
197 views

What would the temperatures on a terraformed moon be like?

In the far future the moon is terraformed and maintains earth-like conditions for people to walk around freely. Gravity is a 6th of earth's. We assume the atmosphere is "well-functioning for human ...
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1answer
81 views

Imagine a well functioning atmosphere on the terraformed moon

Just assume we are long into the future, all other parameters have been met and we have the technology, will and money to terraform our moon and keep it so. Atmosphere, as commonly agreed on, would ...
0
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1answer
66 views

Gravity on the terraformed moon and its inventions [closed]

[Edited version] In this long-into-the-future scenario the Moon has been successfully terraformed, along with other moons in our solar system. Let's just assume economics, AI and human will have made ...
5
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4answers
376 views

We Have Successfully Established Plants and Insects on Mars. How Long Will It Take Them to Colonize the Entire Planet?

In my last question, I have asked on how, once Mars has been terraformed, Terran species of plants and the insects on which the majority of them rely on would adapt to Mars's longer year. By far, the ...
2
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1answer
114 views

How Can Plants and Insects Cope With Living on a Terraformed Mars?

If we humans are serious about terraforming our famous neighbor, Mars, then the terraforming process would take thousands of years before it becomes habitable enough for humans to live in. But that ...
2
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1answer
113 views

Venusian Adaptations

Recently I've been imagining living on a terraformed Venus in a distant future. I've a pretty good idea of how this can be done, having gone through many articles on how to terraform venus, so my ...
5
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1answer
88 views

Terraforming a tide-locked planet

Over several hundred years, a tide-locked, but otherwise Earth-like, planet orbiting a red dwarf is terraformed. The terminator is a very habitable zone, in terms of temperature, atmosphere, etc. ...
3
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2answers
905 views

is it possible to terraform a planet made of human excrement into habitable planet?

my question is pretty much in the title and i mean in "habitable planet" like earth, but not necessary to be same size or content. so i was thinking rather than finding habitable planet which ...
7
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3answers
380 views

Fertilizing desert in magical medieval world

Suppose there exists a magic-based civilization. Their mining techniques are medieval and their understanding of organic chemistry and biology are on the Enlightenment era level. However, they are ...
5
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1answer
146 views

Terraform Mars with Phobos dust?

According to the following reference, a few tons of infalling space dust cause the Martian clouds: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190617125120.htm. These clouds can boost local surface ...
3
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1answer
71 views

How would the technology of this advanced species work? [closed]

I am writing a story where a moderately advanced race of aliens arrive on an earth-like planet and terraform it, even using technology to immediately create landforms. However, this only takes place ...
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2answers
140 views

How would terraforming inhospitable areas on earth itself work? [closed]

Note: The context of Terraforming in my question does not involve changing the atmosphere in any way. It involves creating water sources, changing soil type, rapidly accelerating foreign plant growth ...
4
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1answer
218 views

Terraforming the Nine Earths, Episode I: Could Cyanobacteria Thrive in Muspellheim?

Long ago, I asked a question on how to make the Nine Realms of Norse mythology--Niflheim, Muspelheim, Asgard, Midgard, Jotunheim, Vanaheim, Alfhiem, Svartalfheim and Helheim--a reality in regards to ...
2
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4answers
175 views

Could we give Mars Earth-like gravity using dark energy? [closed]

In the far future, humans are struggling with the idea of whether or not to use dark energy's repulsive-gravity capabilities to surround Mars in a sphere of it (regardless of how, let's assume they ...
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2answers
139 views

What are the logistics of wiping out the current world to the point a “new” generation of humans would not be able to find it? [closed]

Backstory I have a race of biologically advanced aliens that develop by fighting, adapting, and growing immune to the current highest standards of technology a species has to offer. By doing this they'...
2
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3answers
181 views

What would increasing the gravity of a moon do to its planet?

If I terraformed a moon to have enough artificial gravity/atmosphere to support life, would they end up just crashing into each other? Is there a way to not have this happen, e.g., increasing distance ...
5
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2answers
201 views

Atmosphere of a terraformed 10 km planetoid with Earth gravity

Bernal spheres and other O'Neill cylinders are complicated, maintenance-high and fragile beasts. Someone started to make micro-black-holes and put them in asteroids, in order to have 1 to 10+km rock ...
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3answers
342 views

I want to build a flat Earth, for real

A planet recently discovered was explored and proved unworthy of terraforming: It is mostly made of carbonaceous minerals, classifying it as a carbon planet. However, one of the explorers does not see ...
3
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2answers
213 views

Terraformed Venus and Mars

A Traveler from a very advanced civilization has visited the Solar system. He found the humans likable, and decided to leave them a boon. For some reason, he couldn't do anything directly to the Earth ...
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5answers
335 views

Terraforming via rapidly growing organisms, is it a good idea?

Terraforming and maintaining a biosphere suitable for humans is tough, but no worries, Protogon is here! Collaborating with Providence, our scientists have created Hygiea, a series of rapidly growing ...
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5answers
419 views

The Galaxy has been colonised but why the big feet?

Far, far into the future, pretty much the entire Milky Way has been colonised by humans. The thing is that now the Empire has fallen, the technology of FTL travel has been lost in most places. Those ...
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4answers
572 views

Putting oxygen on the Moon - the easy way

It would be nice if there were an atmosphere on the Moon with oxygen; in fact it could be just oxygen at 1/5 the Earth's pressure. People could live there. Now of course given the Moon's lower gravity ...
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5answers
392 views

Fastest way to oxygenate Venus

Scientists recently discovered a propellantless drive capable of completely negating gravity with low energy inputs! Huzzah! Sadly the Earth is going to be destroyed soon by a rogue handwave. Looking ...
6
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1answer
221 views

How long would an array of mass drivers take to terraform Mars by transporting CO2 from Venus?

So I've always assumed Mars never had enough available CO2 on-site for terraforming, something that new research seems to have confirmed. But my ideas have always relied on getting CO2 from alternate ...
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3answers
2k views

Gravitational anomaly (Mascons) creating water-hills

A scenario in the far future -- The moon has been successfully terraformed. All problems have been worked-out, from flinging volatiles into collision course with the moon, up to creating and retaining ...
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5answers
543 views

How would we terraform the moon?

How could we and would we terra-form the moon? I mean, theoretically speaking it should be possible and not too much of a challenge. But i don't know a lot of things, so i'm just not sure. I came up ...
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6answers
454 views

Greenhouse Planet Terraforming - Will a balloon jacket self-stabilise?

Most of what follows is scientifically dubious. I'm looking to clarify one aspect and one aspect alone. A small planet is being terraformed by an alien race who have been doing this for millennia. ...
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3answers
161 views

Giant Terraforming [closed]

In my story, a planet colonizing business goes to a very unlikely part of space to have a good planet in the goldilocks zone. When they out of pure luck, scan a planet almost exactly like earth. They ...
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6answers
348 views

Can I have a glacier on a tidally-locked shallow-sea planet?

I have a planet that is tidally locked to its sun. The ocean is shallow (a few hundred meters) and was artificially created in the past by harvesting the system's Oort cloud or outer-system ice ...
1
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1answer
118 views

What kind of impact could strip Venus and make it spin faster?

I'm trying to create plausible scenario under which we could colonize Venus. Is it possible that Venus could be hit by a planetoid and the impact strips its atmosphere and makes it spin faster? I'm ...
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1answer
147 views

How much material would be required to build a giant sun shade to cool down Venus? [closed]

One way to terraform Venus would be to create a massive sun shade enveloping the planet. How much actual material would be required for this? And where would you get it from?
3
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1answer
104 views

Terraformed planet orbiting a blue star

A planet was terraformed in humanity's distant past by technologically superior beings. The planet is very similar to Earth. I understand blue stars are highly radioactive and thus don't have real ...
2
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2answers
796 views

How long could an ecosystem survive without sunlight?

I am designing a terraformed Venus, where the planet has been given an Earth-like atmosphere but keeps it's original rotation rate. Colonists are importing Earth life to Venus to add a biosphere to ...
6
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3answers
139 views

Effects of comet/asteroid bombardment on planet temperature

I have not had much success finding out what the effects of bombarding a planet with comets or asteroids could have on the temperature of that planet. I expect it would add some heat, and I ...
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2answers
333 views

Terraforming Ganymede, is it possible?

The Hegemony has long looked upon Ganymede as a prime terraforming project for humanity. The Hegemony has the tech for large scale space production so large mirrors or sun shades are able to be built ...
0
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1answer
143 views

How to move up to one million Earth-mass planets? [closed]

Inspired by The One Million Earth Solar System. A civilization wants to create a solar system with a lot of earth-sized planets. How would they go about building it? Specifically, how would they move ...
2
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2answers
86 views

Looking for ideas for a world that requires some earth based mineral to be released into its atmosphere to render it non toxic to life as we know it,

Im busy wrtiting a Space Opera and was going to utilise the "hypothesis", or whatever you call it of an ancient civ mining gold here and utilising it to disperse into its atmosphere, in turn either ...
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4answers
1k views

Is there any way to Terraform Ceres?

In the "Warlords" Universe Ceres is the diplomatic and economic hub of the asteroid belt dominated by the rule of the 'Governor' and the 'Intercessor' (The Speaker for the Hegemon herself). Now I'm ...
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2answers
638 views

How long would it take to colonize the galaxy with FTL? How long before colonization space is at a premium? [closed]

It's easy to find search results for how long it would take without FTL - but I'm wondering how long it would take with FTL, and there don't seem to be many estimates for that. Some very rough ...
5
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4answers
482 views

What are the advantages of terraforming over living in space stations/constructs and visa versa? [duplicate]

It seems to me that the focus on colonizing other planets [edit: using closed/airtight structures] is misguided, and that building space stations with permanent populations would be easier, and would ...
5
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3answers
144 views

Solutions for sustainable living in reduced gravity environment

I am building an idea for a terraformed environment with 1/6 the gravity of Earth, with a permanent human colony that has been established and sustained for 40+ years. I have thrown around a few ideas ...
2
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3answers
90 views

Proxima Centauri's flare: effects on a terraformed planet

Imagine that, in a thousand years, the star system of Proxima centauri has a planet located in its goldilocks zone that has been terraformed by earthling settlers. We do not really know what the ...
2
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3answers
121 views

If an advanced alien civilization wanted to jumpstart evolution on a planet, what chemicals would they need to release in a planets atmosphere? [closed]

Say we have an advanced alien civilization with advanced technology. They encounter a planet teeming with early life (microbes). They want to speed up evolution on the planet and have sentient and non-...
2
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1answer
62 views

Interacting with a separately evolved planetary life system [closed]

If we arrived at another planet that could sustain life as we know it and had already evolved its own native systems of life, with diverse biomes, it is not necessarily the case that it evolved in a ...
5
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1answer
179 views

Energy costs of giving Mars and Venus moons: moving gas giant moons vs. capturing a rogue planet?

As many here likely know, one of the factors that make both Mars and Venus uninhabitable to humans are their lack of a magnetosphere to keep solar winds out. In the setting I am working on, I wanted ...
4
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5answers
331 views

Is a 100% effective mass extinction possible without destroying the planet?

Say I want a 100% effective mass extinction to take place on a planet similar to Earth. It should kill everything, even bacteria. It doesn't need to happen overnight. I'm perfectly fine with some ...

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