https://ghostarchive.org/archive/s3ypg
"A few meters below the former site of Seville’s 1992 World Expo, a promising
climate experiment blending ancient technology and modern science is underway.
Rows of black pipes run along the ceiling and down the bare concrete walls.
These, in turn, connect to bright blue and green tubes and enormous silver
pumps. In a control room to the side, an array of monitors display the heat,
humidity and wind speed above.
“We have deployed several types of cooling systems here, each one used
depending on climatic conditions,” says Maria de la Paz Montero Gutiérrez, a
researcher at the University of Seville, from down in the building’s bowels
where she is helping supervise the project.
In 2020, authorities began to install these cooling systems in two public
spaces in the Isla de La Cartuja neighborhood of what is one of Europe’s
hottest cities. Every day about 30,000 people come to work and study in this
northwestern district, which is mostly non-residential and home to university
campuses, museums, and businesses.
Under the EU-funded project CartujaQanat, the so-called “qanats” – networks of
underground aqueducts – were constructed in a newly-built 750-square meter site
known as the Agora, which is large enough to fit about 400 people, as well as
in a renovated amphitheater from the ‘90s that has a capacity of about 200
people.
The system, created millennia ago but updated for the 21st century, works by
cooling water underground in the naturally low temperatures at night. To cool
water more quickly, some is also sent to the roof via solar-powered pumps and
sprayed out of nozzles in a thin layer through a method known as a “falling
film,” before draining back down underground.
By day, as outdoor temperatures peak, the cool water is sent above ground into
the ceiling to counteract the heat. Water is also funneled into subterranean
pipes that cool air (up to 36,000 square meters an hour), which is then
released via ducts in the public spaces. Outside, mist is sprayed in order to
lower temperatures through evaporation.
“We have half re-invented the qanats, taking from their engineering ingenuity,”
says head of the multi-stakeholder project, Lucas Perea Gil, whose team began
operating the cooling system in 2022, running seasonally from March to October
every year."
Original at
<
https://nextcity.org/features/this-spanish-city-is-resurrecting-a-3000-year-old-solution-to-fight-extreme>
Via
Reasons to be Cheerful:
<
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/what-were-reading-why-maga-suddenly-loves-solar/>
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
