What Earth’s changing climate can teach us about altering the surface of Mars

21.08.2023 - 11:55 / theunconventionalgardener.com / guest

Crew at the International Space Station capture Typhoon Noru [Image credit: NASA]

Gareth Dorrian, University of Birmingham and Ian Whittaker, Nottingham Trent University

In a rare instance of environmental success, the United Nations has just announced it believes the damage to the Earth’s protective ozone layer will be fully restored by the year 2050. This stands in stark contrast to the increasing alarm over the climate emergency, caused by an increasing greenhouse effect.

Both the ozone layer and the greenhouse effect ultimately help control how much ultra-violet (UV) radiation from the sun reaches the Earth’s surface, and how much infra-red (IR) radiation escapes to space. Both these forms of radiation have a critical impact on the habitability of a rocket planet.

Clearly controlling this radiation is a pressing issue on Earth. But it also presents a challenge for those who dream of colonising Mars.

Ultra-violet radiation is a form of light which has a wavelength ranging from 10 – 400 nanometers (1nm is 0.000000001 metres in length). This is shorter and more energetic than visible light. By contrast, the wavelength of a typical 4G phone network is a few tens of centimetres.

Solar-UV can drive the production of the essential Vitamin D in human skin, but excess levels can cause an array of health problems including sunburn, skin cancer and cataracts. It can also damage plants and harm crop production.

On Earth, almost all solar UV is absorbed by the ozone layer, a region of the Earth’s atmosphere extending from about 15–30km in altitude. Without it, life on Earth would be in a lot of trouble.

Ozone is a naturally occurring molecule consisting of three oxygen atoms. The formation of this molecule is carefully balanced by a