Why we can’t make Mars hot enough for us

MAKING Mars habitable by releasing carbon dioxide to heat up the atmosphere is impossible, a study say.

Scientists reckon there is not enough of the gas trapped in the Martian polar ice caps and rocks to bring the temperature up to suitable living conditions.

Evidence suggests it would only raise the temperature from minus 60C to minus 50C, while causing a fiftieth of the change in atmospheric pressure needed.

It means anyone taking off a space suit would most likely see their blood boil and eyeballs and lungs explode because of the difference between the planet’s air pressure and the body’s own internal one.

Professor Bruce Jakosky, of the University of Colorado, who published the study in the journal Nature Astronomy, said: ‘Most CO2 has been stripped away from Mars over billions of years and what remains is not enough to produce greenhouse warming.’ The climate change needed for survival was ‘just not possible’ with current technology, he added.