I have done my research on Mars and it was once temperate and had water on its surface and a magnetosphere. Now pretty much all of that is lost. I mean Mars has a serious temperature gradient. Down on the surface it can feel like summer at your feet but winter at your head. And martian winters go down into the negative triple digits. Yikes, that's cold. I mean yes an Antarctic winter is also in the negative triple digits but only when wind chill is factored in. A martian winter is in the negative triple digits regardless of wind chill. So in order for a civilization to even start off on Mars while it is being terraformed, they would need serious insulation in the winter but not so much in the summer. And at night again they would need serious insulation but not so much in the day unless it is the martian winter. So this basically means they will need to settle underground and deal with the iron dust. But in order to get enough geothermal energy from Mars, they would have to be way down deep. Too deep to see whether it is day or night so they would probably need to send a rover or something near the settlement and find some way to get a clear signal through all that iron oxide in order to not only communicate with people on earth but also to find out if it is day or night on Mars.
So thin atmosphere, serious temperature gradient, both can be avoided in an underground settlement if it is high tech(which any human settlement on Mars would have to be).
Of course if they were making clay out of this iron oxide, it will probably be of no use since when it dried, it would most likely go back to being the iron oxide powder it was before(Making clay out of iron oxide is like using wet sand, while wet is when it is stabilized into the structure that you want it in so water is key. But sand lets go of that water and destabilizes back into a powder. Iron oxide would likely do the same exact thing).
1 problem they would have to solve before everything else is how to melt the iron core so that they form a magnetosphere. My thought on this is possibly putting molten iron through a carbon tube that leads all the way down to the core. Carbon melts at a much higher temperature than iron so it can handle molten iron temperatures without itself melting. The key thing here is that the iron most not solidify before reaching the mantle. If it solidifies before then, the added iron is of no use and will form iron oxide and over time that iron oxide will get to that same sandy consistency as Mars. Of course, this has the issue of super high pressure suddenly being released so there must be another way to get the iron core to melt without dealing with the super high pressure below the crust. But how else could we get enough heat energy to the core to melt it and form a magnetosphere?
The rest of the problems from there are easy to solve(lack of water, just bring water, lack of oxygen, just bring cyanobacteria or plants).
So basically I am wondering these 2 things about Mars and how to live on Mars:
1) How deep would they have to go in order to get enough geothermal energy from Mars that the seasons up on the surface don't bother them(mostly that martian winter I am concerned about)?
2) How could we heat up the iron core enough so that a magnetosphere is formed while not risking solidification of iron or super high pressure suddenly being released? And how could we keep the iron core hot enough so that the magnetosphere is always there?
So thin atmosphere, serious temperature gradient, both can be avoided in an underground settlement if it is high tech(which any human settlement on Mars would have to be).
Of course if they were making clay out of this iron oxide, it will probably be of no use since when it dried, it would most likely go back to being the iron oxide powder it was before(Making clay out of iron oxide is like using wet sand, while wet is when it is stabilized into the structure that you want it in so water is key. But sand lets go of that water and destabilizes back into a powder. Iron oxide would likely do the same exact thing).
1 problem they would have to solve before everything else is how to melt the iron core so that they form a magnetosphere. My thought on this is possibly putting molten iron through a carbon tube that leads all the way down to the core. Carbon melts at a much higher temperature than iron so it can handle molten iron temperatures without itself melting. The key thing here is that the iron most not solidify before reaching the mantle. If it solidifies before then, the added iron is of no use and will form iron oxide and over time that iron oxide will get to that same sandy consistency as Mars. Of course, this has the issue of super high pressure suddenly being released so there must be another way to get the iron core to melt without dealing with the super high pressure below the crust. But how else could we get enough heat energy to the core to melt it and form a magnetosphere?
The rest of the problems from there are easy to solve(lack of water, just bring water, lack of oxygen, just bring cyanobacteria or plants).
So basically I am wondering these 2 things about Mars and how to live on Mars:
1) How deep would they have to go in order to get enough geothermal energy from Mars that the seasons up on the surface don't bother them(mostly that martian winter I am concerned about)?
2) How could we heat up the iron core enough so that a magnetosphere is formed while not risking solidification of iron or super high pressure suddenly being released? And how could we keep the iron core hot enough so that the magnetosphere is always there?