Faced with extreme heat waves, mirrors could help lower the temperature

This is one of the faces of climate change. Everywhere on Earth, the increase in heat waves is endangering our food and water security, our health and our well-being. For a year, temperature records have been set one after another. The month of April 2024 was the hottest on record, according to analyzes by the European Copernicus observatory in its latest report.

As such, 2023 should be passed. Yet global average temperatures were already 1.48°C above the pre-industrial average last year. A (sad) record. Faced with this observation, scientific innovation is essential.

More than 6°C less in homes

In an article published this Monday, June 17, the BBC details an ongoing project in the Kroo Bay district, one of the largest slums in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. During the dry season, the interiors of houses become inhospitable, similar to an oven. One of the residents, Khadija Kamara – who recently lost her six-month-old son Ibrahim to the increasingly frequent extreme heat waves in the West African country – took the initiative to install a reflective panel. The objective: to see the temperatures of the thermometer placed in your house drop.

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A device in which Peter Dynes took part. Based in Belfast (Northern Ireland), he is one of the leaders of MEER (Mirrors for Earth’s Energy Rebalancing), a non-profit organization still in its infancy and which aims to reduce global temperatures by working with local institutions . “Faced with the acceleration of climate change, we are banking on adaptation”, he explains to the broadcaster. These panels would help reduce the interior temperature of homes by more than 6°C. The devices feature a highly reflective coating made from recycled materials.

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The project is only just beginning in Freetown, but it has already changed the lives of residents for the better, one of them told the BBC. In this capital, nearly half a million people live in slums or densely populated neighborhoods.

Most houses were built using corrugated iron sheets which, over time, erode, rust and trap heat. A phenomenon which makes the increase in temperatures increasingly difficult to bear (and dangerous) for populations.

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A life-changing device, but nothing new

Developing countries, on the front lines of climate change, are rushing to find solutions to adapt. Speaking to the media, Peter Dynes underlined the need to implement more affordable, more scalable, but also more efficient systems. However, using reflective surfaces as a cooling method is, in itself, nothing new. “The albedo [une propriété fondamentale des surfaces réfléchissantes] has been used for hundreds or even thousands of yearsobserves the expert, who then evokes the white walls of the houses that we find in entire villages in Spain or Greece. It’s the same principle.” But with the use of paints, in the tropics, homes will get dirty very quickly with humidity and dust.

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MEER also wants to use reflective panels in agricultural environments to reduce groundwater evaporation and better protect crops against drought. His next project will take place in India. A country which, as specialists regularly point out, records long, intense and frequent heat waves.