Situated only 25Km south-wet of Riyadh, the King Abdullah City for Atomic & Renewable Energy (KA-CARE) sustainable city will be the new home to the burgeoning clean energy sector in the kingdom. The site includes commercial, academic and research facilities for the nuclear and renewable energy industries and associated sciences. As, in part, a demonstration project; KA CARE will help to foster innovation, creative thinking and develop opportunities for both its 80,000 residents and visiting business people and academics which it hopes to attract from the global pool of talent in this area of innovation

The sustainable city itself is planned as a model for future urban planning, infrastructure, energy generation, education, healthcare and community and social development and alternative approaches to real estate development. With a net-zero carbon emissions target, it seeks to illustrate how a quality lifestyle can be achieved with a dramatically lower impact on the natural environment compared with present-day models of living.

Representing the start of a paradigm shift for the Kingdom in its transition away from its economic dependency on fossil fuels, to a more diversified and sustainable economic model of prosperity, KA CARE demonstrates not only how urban planning might be carried out in the future, but how individual building types could be reinterpreted and re-engineered to reduce the burden they place both on the environment and their owner’s budgets. These building types include various residential models, retail and commercial types, healthcare and education facilities, leisure and recreation centers, university and research buildings and community and mosque buildings.