Elon Musk has pledged to settle Mars. This book offers a reality check

A City on Mars: Challenges and Realities of Space Settlement #

The promise of starting life anew on Mars may be alluring, particularly as the climate crisis intensifies and space technology advances. However, the reality of settling Mars would present daunting challenges. A newly released book explores the notion that intentions to colonize the red planet within the next 30 years face significant hurdles, potentially dooming them to failure.

The authors investigate life on Mars’s unforgiving environment, discussing topics such as building farms in space, reproduction, and the implications of a new space race. Initially enthusiastic about human life on Mars, the authors turned skeptical upon deeper research. They have stated, “Leaving a 2-degree Celsius warmer Earth for Mars would be like leaving a messy room so you can live in a toxic waste dump.”

The authors concluded that scaling up to a million people on Mars without catastrophe is implausible, stressing the need for generations of work to achieve self-sustainability. They describe Mars as a harsh environment requiring complex equipment for survival.

Regarding the current lifetime, there remains potential for research. There is optimism for establishing a lunar research station to study how organisms fare across generations, possibly witnessing people land on Mars for exploration and return missions. However, the likelihood of establishing families on Mars remains distant.

Reproduction presents major challenges. Years of research on astronauts provide limited understanding due to the protective magnetosphere surrounding Earth. Exposure to Mars’s gravity, about 38% of Earth’s, raises concerns about bone density and structural integrity impacting childbirth and development.

Mars presents an inhospitable environment. Humans evolved on Earth, away from Mars’s lacking atmosphere and high-perchlorate soil, which might disrupt hormones. Its thin atmosphere and aggressive dust storms pose severe risks alongside high radiation levels due to Mars lacking a protective magnetosphere.

Mars, on average, remains 140 million miles away, and communications face significant delays, making emergency responses challenging. Space governance remains ambiguous; the 1967 Outer Space Treaty lacks specificity as space developments accelerate.

The responsibility for activities in space, including any ventures by companies, falls upon their respective nations, raising geopolitical concerns, especially amid U.S.-China relations. Regarding sustainability, closed-loop ecology necessitates significant research to sustain life in artificial, sealed agricultural environments.

Persistent unknowns and impactful variables reinforce the narrative that settling Mars is a complex endeavor far exceeding mere technological progression or ambition.