Facilities

-Goethe

There are many facilities needed for a colony on Mars such as greenhouses and mining facilities, highways and laboratories, and domed and tented communities.

Click here for a Mars colony developed by students 

Living Quarters

What places on Mars could be used for living quarters? Think about the cliff houses built by Native Americans and the underground sod houses built by early American pioneers.  To read more about construction materials from Mars and lunar resources, visit this site.

What about safety? Fires in self-contained habitats will be of major concern to Mars dwellers. Fire detection and suppression systems would have to address the detection of fires, the suppression of fires, and the cleanup after a fire. Smoke detection systems, oxygen masks, and emergency training will all have to be provided within the habitats and to the crewmembers.

Radiation protection, external dust removal, and storage will also be major considerations in designing living and working areas. Protection from radiation is another important consideration for building housing on Mars. The thin air and small magnetic field offer little protection from solar flares and cosmic radiation. Underground houses could afford some protection, but greenhouses would need a source of light.

Working Facilities

What types of work will the first explorers be doing, and what types of laboratories and factories will they need? There will be people who are providing products such as food and energy, and people who are exploring the planet, finding resources, and looking for life, fossils, and new places to live. There will be people who are designing and building machines and equipment, and people to teach others how to do these things.

What types of work facilities will they need? What are the major buildings and facilities in your community? Think back to the example of a frontier town. What were the major buildings in the center of town? A general store, the blacksmith's, the saloon, the jail, the barber, and the doctor's office. Why were these facilities the most important to people in the 1800s? What types of facilities will people today (or tomorrow) need to have? Will there be laboratories, hospitals, machine shops, and stores?

How will people get from one place to another? Will you need a transportation system, tunnels, or other structures to connect facilities?

Recreation

Humans need recreation in order to maintain their sense of well-being. What are the most important types of recreation to you? What kinds of facilities do you think should be considered for a Martian colony? Would exercise, or going to the library, the movies, or an art gallery be important? What would sports be like in the 1/3g on Mars? How big would a baseball field be, or how high would the basketball hoop be?

Think of times in history when people have lived in isolated, difficult environments, such as during wartime. What were the most important things to the soldiers in Vietnam, Korea, or World War II? Ask your parents or grandparents. Letters from home, movies, books, and magazines were all considered very important to the morale of the troops. Would a central location for people to send messages home or to view their families back home on a monitor be something you would like to have? Remember that the mind needs recreation as much as the body when designing your recreation facilities.

The Martian sunlight is about 43% of the strength of that on Earth, but solar power can be used to make electricity on Mars. We have already used solar power on Mars to power small spacecraft on the Martian surface. 

How much bigger will the solar panels (photovoltaic panels on Mars)  have to be to supply power for a large colony? Dust on Mars will affect solar power systems and will need to be removed.

There is plenty of wind on Mars, and wind power could be another source of energy for the colony. Nuclear power or radioisotope thermoelectric generators is another possible method of generating electricity; they are already used to power spacecraft. Geothermal energy or heat from the interior of a planet, related to volcanic activity, may exist on Mars. If colonists could tap into these sources of heat, they could possibly use them for energy.

What about fuel? The Sabatier Process can convert carbon dioxide into methane, which is an excellent fuel. When planning your colony, consider where the explorers will get their power from and how it will be manufactured.

What about waste materials? How will you recycle or dispose of the different types of waste created by a colony? Can these materials be used by different parts of the colony?

Remember, resources will be very limited on Mars and recycling will be much more important. How can different facilities share limited resources?

Questions to think about:

• What parts of the colony would need the most power? 
• What would be the most difficult materials to recycle?

Next... Transportation (pg. 5 of 10)