Image: Fifa/Playback
For the first time in history, the 2022 World Cup will take place between November and December as before between June and July. The reason for this change is to avoid the high temperatures in Qatar in the middle of the year. Despite this, players and fans are still confronted with thermometers exceeding 40 °C.
First, one of the proposals to solve the problem was to use drones to create artificial clouds. The idea was to build giant carbon drones that would release a helium compound to form clouds over the stages which would help provide shade, cool the surroundings and filter out sunlight.
However, as the project was deemed too expensive around $500,000 the drone idea was abandoned. Instead, the stadiums received technological innovations to reduce the Qatar haze.
First, the roof of the stages has light colors to better reflect the sun’s rays. The shape of the ceilings was also designed to help deflect the warm flow of air from the sea of the Persian Gulf. In addition, the slope of the roof was designed to create shadows that cover a good part of the field and stands.
With around 40,000 spectators in the stands, every fan is also a potential source of heat and moisture. To alleviate this, a ventilation system was installed under each seat to cool the surrounding area with jets of air.
And for the athletes on the pitch, a new air conditioning system was designed to direct jets of air into the stadium and create a 2 meter cold layer over the pitch and stands. The angle of these jets has been designed so that they do not hit players directly.
The hot air, on the other hand, is extracted from the environment by an extraction system as it rises, cooled, filtered and fed back into the cleaned stadium.
According to the BBC, the entire cooling system in the stadiums will be powered by a newly built solar plant located 80 km from the center of Doha, the capital of Qatar.