Paris’s New Weapons in Climate Fight Are Metro Turnstiles and the Seine
No contribution can seem too small to pursue in taking on the challenges of a changing planet.
Paris is one of the few cities in the world that calculates the carbon footprint of its territory.
Photographer: Eric Feferberg/AFP/Getty ImagesWhen it comes to fighting climate change, every bit counts. At least, that was the thinking behind a small test project last summer at a metro station in Paris, the city where the world’s first legally binding climate accord was signed.
Commuters who went through turnstiles at the Miromesnil station in central Paris powered mini turbines, converting kinetic energy into electricity. During the two-day pilot project, 27,000 people crossed six turnstiles — a tiny fraction of the more than 1.5 billion passengers who use the French capital’s metro system annually. The energy produced was minuscule, but if installed across the city’s metro network, these turbines could produce 136 megawatts a year, saving 30,000 tons of CO2, according to Iberdrola SA, the Spanish energy company in charge of the project.