Parker images the surface of Venus
For original images go here and here.
During its flybys of Venus in July 2020 and February 2021 the Parker Solar Probe used its wide field camera to take images of the night side of Venus in red optical and near infrared wavelengths, essentially measuring the heat (in the range of 863 degrees Fahrenheit) being emitted by the planet’s surface.
The resulting images, the first orbital photos of Venus’ surface in the optical, showed continent-sized surface details that matched previously made radar maps, and confirmed as expected that the higher altitudes are cooler than the lower.
The paper outlining these results can be read here.
The two pictures to the right compare previous radar maps (on the right) with the new Parker image (on the left). The central dark and cooler area is a region called Aphrodite Terra, which like Earth’s continents sits higher than the surrounding terrain.
Note that though cooler, the surface at these dark areas is still hellishly hot, more than 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Exploring the surface of Venus is going to be a far far far more challenging task that going to Mars.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
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For original images go here and here.
During its flybys of Venus in July 2020 and February 2021 the Parker Solar Probe used its wide field camera to take images of the night side of Venus in red optical and near infrared wavelengths, essentially measuring the heat (in the range of 863 degrees Fahrenheit) being emitted by the planet’s surface.
The resulting images, the first orbital photos of Venus’ surface in the optical, showed continent-sized surface details that matched previously made radar maps, and confirmed as expected that the higher altitudes are cooler than the lower.
The paper outlining these results can be read here.
The two pictures to the right compare previous radar maps (on the right) with the new Parker image (on the left). The central dark and cooler area is a region called Aphrodite Terra, which like Earth’s continents sits higher than the surrounding terrain.
Note that though cooler, the surface at these dark areas is still hellishly hot, more than 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Exploring the surface of Venus is going to be a far far far more challenging task that going to Mars.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Why is it snowing? In space. At this time of the year.
Well, it is winter after all…
” Exploring the surface of Venus is going to be a far far far more challenging task that going to Mars.”
It sure is, just ask the Russians.
Blair Ivey: The Soviet effort to successfully land unmanned probes on Venus and actually beam back data for up to an hour or so was truly a magnificent achievement. As much as I despise their top-down authoritarian communist politics, this was something for which they deserve every honor.
” confirmed as expected that the higher altitudes are cooler than the lower”
So abdiabatic cooling works on Venus, too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqfWXFunD14
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell: “How To Terraform Venus (Quickly)”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-WO-z-QuWI
On the equator of Mercury, which is much closer to the sun, the maximum heat is 800°F.
If Venus is heated by the sun, the maximum temperature on the upper atmosphere (near 500°F) would need to penetrate the dense atmosphere, where over 90% of the light is reflected back into space. (CO2 as a blanket would insulate Venus… Perpetual dimness as bad as a half mile under the ocean, would not create a greenhouse affect)
Venus, under its atmosphere, is 860° on average, hotter than mercury, far hotter than the sun can provide. This average applies to both the day and night side.
With a nine month revolution, and a 10 month rotation, sunrise to sunrise is nearly 5 months long. Cooling during the long night does not take place, therefore it is not solar driven.
Even the earth is 100° warmer than our moon (using average temperatures). Although 150° does not penetrate the earths atmosphere. How? The Chinook winds.
https://www.livescience.com/58884-chinook-winds.html
A law of nature that does not appear in any of the climate models. Although it holds heating records.
40 years of satellite observation has never documented a single case of greenhouse affect. It does not exist, and violates this natural law.
A transfer of heat from a cold object to a warmer one does not occur in nature. Second law of thermodynamics
https://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/k-12/airplane/thermo2.html
Closer you get to a heat source, the hotter the temperature becomes. All heat is friction.
The hottest temperatures on Venus are the deepest Canyons with the lowest altitude. Which is also the places with the highest barometric pressure… Just like the earth… Just like every planet in our solar system with an atmosphere!
Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and Uranus are all hotter than the surface (photosphere) of the sun… For the same reason that Venus is hot.
Mirrors in space blocking Sunlight from Venus atmosphere to terraform it, would not cool it one bit. Because it generates its own heat.
The temperature on Venus at 1 atm it’s near 70°F. Perfect temperature for life. (The temperature of Venus’s upper atmosphere is colder than any place on earth!)
Bio engineered bacteria and extremafiles from ocean vents on earth, floating near one bar of pressure altitude, to convert the carbon dioxide atmosphere into biomass, water and oxygen. Just as they did on earth.
With no natural predators to restrict growth rate… It would only take a few thousand years to terraform into a oxygen / carbon rich world.
As the atmospheric pressure goes down, the temperature will also go down. The oxygen will react with solar gases making water, which will soon turn into oceans. Just like earth.
The same technology can be used on Saturn where gravity is only 10% more than earths. With so much hydrogen in the atmosphere, Saturn would soon turn into a Waterworld. Photosynthesis could be a problem… But then not all life needs sunlight.
Max:
The main problem on Venus is the absolute lack of water (and also hydrogen), so that for the multiplication of bacteria in very large quantities, which would be necessary for the transformation of the atmosphere, it is not sufficient by orders of magnitude.
But I do agree with you on one point: we need a unit-based mechanism that, like life, can multiply exponentially by itself. Earth has about the same amount of CO2 as Venus, only in Earth’s case it’s locked up in the rocks. The goal should be to achieve this “somehow” for Venus as well. So the reaction of CaO+CO2 to CaCO3.
Max:
“Venus: Moment of Inertia and Length of Day – Jean-Luc Margot”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMXjRxNy8qo
That was deep, much of the Termanology and math was way over my head. Professors lecturing other professors and grad students stuff.
I’ll have to try again, to fully understand how Venus rotation can vary so much and blame it on the wind… The causation of wind they blame on the heating and the contraction between the sun side and the night side when the temperatures in the picture above show no difference… The suns energy in most wavelengths does not penetrate the carbon dioxide atmosphere enough to influence the temperature… Especially when the temperature already exceeds what’s being received from the sun.
To say that we know the science, claiming is is factual, when all they have is theories based upon assumptions… With insufficient data, or data that is ignored, is to build your house upon the sand. Or as Zimmerman says, “”The uncertainty of science”” particularly when people purposely undermine the data for recognition (Grant money) or to purposely mislead the known and verified physical science replacing it with science fiction, political science and a little Scientology.
It is the ongoing attempt to control our thoughts and lives, like they did hundreds of years ago to control trade by telling sailors not to sail beyond the site of land, or “monsters” would get them, still occurs today… It’s just more sophisticated. (were you scared by the Covid monster?)
Max:
I was really amazed to hear and see all the information about the structure of the planetary body that can be gleaned from highly accurate analysis of a planet’s (in this case Venus) axis of rotation.