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Faced with upcoming heat waves, major cities are adapting. The first solution is revegetation, but there are also porous pavers that allow water to infiltrate.
With each new heat wave, the cities are hot. To fight against heat islands and find a little freshness, the first solution is revegetation. In Bordeaux (Gironde)the focus is on playgrounds. 115 nursery and primary schools are going green. In Lille (North) also, schools are hunting tar. The city has launched a plan to remove the bitumen. In the courtyard, the coating is replaced by cobblestones which have the particularity of letting water infiltrate.
Porous pavers made from seashells
These porous pavers were designed in the laboratory of an engineering school in Caen (Calvados). They are made from reused and crushed shells. They allow an innovative system: rainwater is absorbed and stored in pipes. In the event of extreme heat, it comes out by capillarity and lowers the temperature. Bordeaux, Nice (Alpes-Maritimes) and Toulouse (Upper Garonne) have already experimented with this system, which could be an alternative when cities cannot green.