dietz%usc-cse%USC-ECL%SRI-NIC@sri-unix.UUCP (12/27/83)
One of the more intriguing discoveries in space exploration was the finding from spectrometer on a atmospheric probe of the Pioneer Venus spacecraft that deuterium is greatly enriched in Venus's atmosphere. The deuterium/hydrogen-1 ratio is 100 times larger on Venus than on Earth; the hydrogen there is nearly 2% deuterium (by weight). Apparently Venus has been acting for millions of years as an isotope separator. Sulfuric acid, water and other hydrogen compounds are dissociated at high altitude by solar UV radiation. Hydrogen-1 atoms escape much faster than deuterium atoms because of their lower mass and consequent higher average velocity at any given temperature. Apart from making deuterium extraction on Venus attractive, this enrichment may make terraforming Venus much easier. Deuterium undergoes fusion reactions much more easily than hydrogen-1. There was some concern back during WW-2 at Los Alamos that the first atomic bomb would start self-propagating nuclear reactions in the earth's atmosphere between deuterium and nitrogen. This didn't occur (of course); perhaps it would have if there was more deuterium. We can begin terraforming Venus by dropping a nuclear bomb into its atmosphere. If the deuterium reactions are self sustaining most of the atmosphere will be blown off into space. We'd probably want to blow up Venus when it's behind the sun to avoid flash/EMP effects on Earth. All this depends on whether deuterium/nitrogen reactions can be made self sustaining. The difficulties encountered in building the H-bomb suggest that it's not possible (too bad). If so, we can build a mammoth fusion bomb on Venus using native deuterium. This would make lots of neutrons, though, so it would have to be detonated high in the atmosphere to avoid inducing radioactivity in the crust.
lars%ACC@sri-unix.UUCP (12/28/83)
From: <lars@ACC> I was somewhat jolted by your suggestion that we terraform Venus by nuking it. If possible, I'd rather see it terraformed to a livable pre-holocaust earth likeness. Seriously, 1. Do we need to remove all the deuterium before building an atmosphere ? 2. I would expect the explosion to leave a vacuum (and no planet). Are you expecting to find a planet with some atmosphere ? Lars Poulsen <Lars@ACC>
eder@ssc-vax.UUCP (Dani Eder) (01/03/84)
A simpler and more controllable method of terraforming Venus
would be to shine more sunlight on it and boil the atmosphere off.
Let us say you wanted to raise the temperature by a factor of 4.
This requires 64 times as much incident intensity. Assume that
this is gotten from solar sails in Venus vicinity. They need a
total surface area of 7.24 billion km**2. If their thickness is
.15 microns, then the volume of material required is only 1.1 km**3,
not an unreasonable quantity.
DaniEder
Boeing Aerospace Company
ssc-vax!ederbraddy@houxl.UUCP (D.BRADDY) (01/04/84)
Why would you want to explode fusion bombs in Venus' atmosphere??? ===David Braddy houxl!braddy
giles@ucf-cs.UUCP (Bruce Giles) (01/11/84)
Let us say you wanted to raise the temperature by a factor of 4.
This requires 64 times as much incident intensity. Assume that
this is gotten from solar sails in Venus vicinity. They need a
total surface area of 7.24 billion km**2. If their thickness is
.15 microns, then the volume of material required is only 1.1 km**3,
not an unreasonable quantity.
And we wave a fond farewell to the lightsails as they accelerate into
the darkness of interstellar space.
(may not make too much sense towards the end, but it sounds good)
(hint: divide 7.24 billion km**2 light pressure at Venus by the mass
of 1.1 km**3 of material, and use F = ma).
Bruce Giles
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