[En ligne] Visionnez l’enregistrement de la conférence “Air-Conditioning the Sahara: A History of Environmental Architecture” de Paul Bouet (OCS/AUSser), à l’ETH Zürich du 07 mars 2023

Paul Bouet (membre OCS/AUSser, Eav&t Paris-Est) est maître de conférences associé en histoire et cultures architecturales à l’École et actuellement chercheur postdoctoral à l’Institute for the history and theory of architecture (gta Institute) de l’ETH Zürich.

Visionnez l’enregistrement de cette conférence : Air-Conditioning the Sahara

Présentation

Cette conférence présentait son nouveau projet de recherche qui s’intéresse à la tentative française de créer des bâtiments et des villes adaptés au climat du désert pour y extraire du pétrole et du gaz naturel pendant la guerre d’Algérie.

Air-​Conditioning the Desert: The French Attempt to Urbanize the Algerian Sahara at War, 1954–1962

In the mid-​1950s, massive reserves of fossil fuels were discovered in the Sahara, coinciding with the beginning of the Algerian war of independence. This led the French colonizer to try to control and extract these strategic resources by creating industrial settlements in the desert. Architects, engineers, urban planners, scientists, medical doctors, military staff, policy makers and industrialists participated in this endeavour. Among the many challenges faced by the colonizer, the most crucial one was the extremely hot and arid desert climate, which the French attempted to adapt to by developing strategies to air-​conditioning buildings and cities. Bouet’s project investigates both the history and the legacy of this attempt, which left traces in the African desert, in practices of European architecture and thermal engineering, and in the planet’s atmosphere.

Pascal Fort

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