[imagesource: Dezeen]

There’s this architecture studio, Abiboo, with headquarters in Spain, the USA, and India, that has designed the concept for a future city on Mars.

They are calling it Nüwa and have designed it to house as many as 250 000 people.

I still can’t decide if I would like to be one of them. Do we really have to do colonisation again? Really? Then again, if Earth becomes unlivable, what’s a human to do?

The studio explained everything about the city to Dezeen, saying that the materials used for construction will come from the Red Planet itself, and be used to create a vertically embedded, cliffside system of tunnels and pods that extend inside a mountain.

The founder of Abiboo, Alfredo Munoz, believes Mars is a much more fitting place to settle compared to the moon:

“Permanent habitats on the Moon that are self-sufficient would be challenging, including the lack of water and critical minerals,” he told Dezeen.

“On the other hand, Mars offers the right resources to create a fully sustainable settlement.”

Image: Dezeen

Developed with scientific group SONet, they’ve thought about how humans will need to be protected from the sun’s radiation while simultaneously needing its light.

That’s why it will be built vertically into a cliff instead of underground or with massive enclosures.

Food can grow on the top of the cliff. Image: Dezeen

Nüwa will combine the benefits of previously proposed surface and tunnel dwellings, says Munoz:

“Some past solutions for habitats on Mars propose exciting buildings on the surface of the red planet,” he said.

“The challenge with these solutions is that to protect effectively and long-term from radiation, the buildings’ skin needs to be thick and opaque.”

“Alternative past solutions on Mars are underground, located inside lava tubes or craters,” he continued.

“Such building configurations might provide a more efficient and safe technical solution than those on the surface. However, access to light is essential for humans’ phycological well-being, and spending long-term underground might not be the ideal solution.”

Image: Dezeen

The biggest challenge will be manufacturing breathable air but otherwise, self-sufficiency is possible because hydroponic systems for making food and solar generation systems for making electricity already largely exist the studio believes.

Window pods on the cliff face. Image: Dezeen

Take a journey through the whole city in this video:

Elon Musk seems to think that the creation of a self-sufficient city on Mars can’t happen in this lifetime, but Alfredo Munoz disagrees:

“We estimate that by 2054 we could be able to start building a settlement like Nüwa,” Munoz said.

“However, this date is tentative as there are many critical paths associated with a city on Mars,” he continued.

“If the right resources are in place and some of the required technologies on Earth support the speedy implementation, Nüwa could be finished by 2100.”

Idealistic much?

[source:dezeen]