[Space] Terraformed Venus as a setting

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by Mailanka

Listening to people discuss solar shades for Venus instantly brought to mind the image of a "black sun", an eclipsed sun with its ring of fire staring balefully down at the alien landscape of this terraformed world.

"Black Sun" certainly is an interesting bit of phraseology. Google reveals that among other things it can refer to an occult symbol related to Germanic neopaganism, a major part of Mesoamerican cosmology, and there is some sort of alchemical angle as well. Here's an even more cool picture:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...of_fire%22.jpg

There are many more if you google "annular eclipse."

I've been reading more about Terraforming Venus, and there are certainly non-superscience ideas for speeding up rotation and even tilting the axis- though they are nonetheless epically epic endeavors and take at least 30 years- but none for moving its orbit significantly. Thus all schemes need some sort of sunshade. One interesting thing is that a year could be a nicely regular eight months of 28 days, with a system for leap years.

I've also found schemes that would actually leave deposits of magnesium and calcium carbonate all over the place, which is handy for cement and numerous other uses. Score!

Leaving Venus in it's own orbit gets a year that is 0.615 Earth years, though. That's annoying for someone who would be trying to stat cities and the surrounding countrysides, as far as cropland productivity, anyway. I've still been thinking about it, though. Anyone have simple ideas for dealing with it?