Europe can out-cool America with water-based district cooling

An MIT/Politecnico di Milano professor argues Europe should reject the default US-style ‘dripping box’ approach to cooling and instead embrace water- and ground-based district cooling. Using rivers, lakes or seas as thermal reservoirs, cities can store coolth and release it on hot days via coordinated networks, as seen in Paris’s Fraîcheur de Paris and Geneva. This approach reduces street heat, eases pressure on electricity grids, and supports a mixed strategy that also improves building design and shading. With Europe’s engineering strengths, a Europe-wide Fraîcheurs du Monde could be a forward-looking cooling system for a warming century, rather than a mere fallback.