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Terraforming: why the Moon is a better target than Mars (bigthink.com)

submitted 1 year ago by btaf45@kbin.social to c/space@kbin.social

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The first world that humans should inhabit beyond the Earth is the Moon, not Mars. Here's how to terraform our lunar neighbor.

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[–] Pons_Aelius@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Not really. The extra thrust involved would be a rounding error in the total costs.

If I need a buy car to drive to the shops to get food, the extra added cost in fuel if the shop is 10 km away vs 30 km away is nothing compared to the cost of the car.

[–] btaf45@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

if the shop is 10 km away vs 30 km away

It's nothing at all like that. The moon is 384 megameters away. Mars is 54000 to 150000 megameters away, depending on orbits.

So it would be like 384 meters vs 54-150 kilometers.

Escaping the gravity well on the moon is also much cheaper.

[In terms of infrastructure and accessibility, it’s really no contest. The Moon is closer, always has a view of Earth, can exchange signals and deliverables hundreds of times more quickly than can be exchanged between Earth and Mars, and is easier to land on and take off from. Certain infrastructure could be easily shared between the Earth and the Moon, such as the internet, whereas Mars would likely, due to its remote nature, need its own standalone infrastructure.]