Where does the name “White Mars” come from?
I obviously have to give credit (and apologies) to Kim Stanley Robinson, who wrote an excellent fictional trilogy about possible future terraforming of Mars – Red Mars / Green Mars / Blue Mars. His novels were based on the conventional warm-wet past. When I developed the alternative “iceworld Mars” concept, I was moved to use his naming convention, since it was so evocative, and also described neatly and pithily everything about the new model. In “White Mars”, Mars is no longer the Red Planet (although it has lots of red dust). It is dominated by the behaviour of CO2 ice and snow. Like water ice, these are white or clear. Massive CO2 ice does not show the distinctive blue colour of thick glacier ice. As far as I can tell it is totally colourless. Interestingly, Robinson has moved on from Mars to write another novel about Antartctica. Some reviewers have nicknamed this book “White Mars”! Robinson is also associated with the Mars Society, A public movement urging manned missions to Mars.
