Simply amazing. It's a shame that most people will be bored with this as it doesn't match sci-fi.
I don't think it's significant. In fact, I think it's a lot of wasted money and effort. It's foolhardy.
Everything about Mars wants to kill any human who steps foot on there. What little is left of the atmosphere is unbreatheable. Combined with the lack of magnetic poles, solar radiation will poison you in short order without serious protection, which would take a monumental effort to provide.
Mineral resources would require massive excavation and processing systems, and would probably yield less benefit than just shipping raw materials there.
The soil wants to kill everything you try to plant there, and poison your lungs and kill you if you breathe it in.
I don't know why we continue to explore this dead planet. There is no future there for mankind.