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Q&A How to Terraform a Dead Earth

Your question makes no sense due to its disregard of basic science. The atmosphere consists primarily of carbon dioxide and methane So did the early Earth's, and life was able to start here. This ...

posted 4y ago by Olin Lathrop‭

Answer
#1: Initial revision by user avatar Olin Lathrop‭ · 2020-08-05T18:52:19Z (over 4 years ago)
Your question makes no sense due to its disregard of basic science.

<blockquote>The atmosphere consists primarily of carbon dioxide and methane</blockquote>

So did the early Earth's, and life was able to start here.  This is clearly not a problem for some types of life.

<blockquote>Shallow seas cover 40% of the oceans</blockquote>

That's a great place for life.  You've got generally warm water, sunlight, and minerals washing off the adjoining land masses.

Since you have liquid water on the surface, there are clearly places that aren't too hot or too cold for life, even just the life we know of here on Earth.

<blockquote>Deep seas cover 32% of the oceans</blockquote>

That together with your vulcanism is yet another habitat that we know life can survive in.  Whole ecosystems have evolved on Earth around geothermal vents on the ocean floor.

<blockquote>Such a series of eruptions would have released enough greenhouse gases to wipe out even the toughest of organisms</blockquote>

This make no sense, and you give no justification for this conclusion.  OK, so somehow a lot of CO<sub>2</sub> was dumped  into the atmosphere.  That may have increased the temperature and CO<sub>2</sub> content of the atmosphere.  But, the end result still has liquid water on the surface, so it's not a runaway greenhouse situation like Venus.  Some oganisms would have died out, but others would have been favored.  Doing the same to Earth today might cause a mass extinction, but hardly a total extinction.

<blockquote>too extreme for our first wave of terraforming pioneers, blue-green cyanobacteria</blockquote>

Are you sure about that?  And even if cyanobacteria as we have on Earth can't handle at least a few niches on this planet, they are certainly not the only choice for life, even oxygen-producing life.

The real problem you will have with building up oxygen if the planet never had much before, is that iron in the soil will bind with the oxygen for millions of years.  Only after most available iron is oxidized, can you build up significant levels in the atmosphere.  This is exactly what happened on the early Earth.

<blockquote>axial tilt varying from 109.7 to 118.32 degrees</blockquote>

How can an axial tilt exceed 90&deg;?  <i>Think</i> about it. After that, it's really just a 90&deg;-N&deg; tilt in the other direction with the poles flipped (which you already said is the case).

<blockquote>A single moon 3,474.2 miles wide and orbiting "Asgard" from a distance of 384,400 miles</blockquote>

So the moon is a bit larger and a bit farther than Earth's moon.  How is the moon diameter relevant to 5 digits, though?  This makes no sense.  First, that level of precision is absurd for something that must have mountains and valleys.  Second, I can't imagine what difference it would make if the moon was 3,474.0 or 3,475.0 miles wide instead.

<blockquote>orbiting both stars from a distance of 109 million miles</blockquote>

Huh? What?  Even if you mean this to be the <i>average</i> distance to the two stars, that forces the stars to be implausibly close to each other.

<hr>

Basically, you need to go back and re-think your world from a basis of science, unless you mean this to be a magic-driven place (in which case it's pointless asking what science tells us will happen).