Elon Musk reflects on solar reflectors instead of hammering Mars to warm it up

When the founder of SpaceX, Elon Musk, launches on Twitter, it can be difficult to follow. One moment, he is suggesting that we nuke Mars to accelerate the warming of the red planet for settlers, the next day, it reflects solar reflector satellites.

Although the notion of Mars is the most catchy notion, there is a rather intriguing science behind the concept of Mars' orbital mirrors.

Let's go back to 2006, when Rigel Woida, a student from the University of Arizona, won a NASA award to study "the use of large-aperture orbital mirrors to" terraform "an area of ​​the Martian surface so that humans can colonize the red planet cheaply. "

It's a sci-fi dream to find a way to make Mars more livable for human life. Mars can be extremely cold and would require significant investments to create safe habitats and protective suits against extreme temperatures. Would not it be nice to be able to warm it up a bit?

Musk did not explicitly mention Woida's research, but this work is directly related to the reflector concept. Woida published a report in 2007 (PDF link) detailing the possible operation of such a system. The idea would be to place a series of orbiting satellites that would strategically reflect the heat of the sun on the surface of Mars.

"It might make sense to have thousands of solar reflector satellites to warm Mars compared to artificial suns," Musk tweeted Tuesday, suggesting that the best option remains "to be determined".

It may be wise to have thousands of solar solar reflector satellites to warm Mars compared to artificial suns (to be determined)

– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 20, 2019

Musk also took a moment to clarify what he means by "nuke Mars," which means "refers to a steady stream of nuclear fusion explosions with very low spin-offs over the air." 39 atmosphere to create artificial suns, just like our sun would not make it radioactive. "

Nuke Mars refers to a continuous stream of very low-impact nuclear fusion explosions over the atmosphere to create artificial suns. Just like our sun, it would not become radioactive Mars.

– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 20, 2019

NASA, however, is not as sure of this nuclear plan. In mid-2018, the space agency said Mars terraforming is not possible using current technology.

Woida concluded in his article that the reflector concept was feasible and that "the technical requirements required to complete the heating of a small part of Mars are achievable".

Musk and SpaceX train a lot with the satellites around the Earth thanks to the Starlink Broadband System. Maybe Musc will use some of SpaceX's resources for the mirrors of Mars while the next generation society Starship is getting closer and closer to launch. Musk hopes to one day colonize the red planet.

It would be nice to wear sun hats and longshoremen if humans would ever settle on Mars.