Smog-Eating Buildings

Smog-Eating Buildings Battle Air Pollution

Sunlight triggers chemical reactions in the façades of buildings in Mexico City and Milan to improve air quality

Don Willmott | March 27, 2015

Architects and environmental scientists have been teaming up to address an interesting question: is it possible—and economically feasible—to design and construct buildings that can passively clean smoggy urban air?
As it turns out, relatively straightforward chemical reactions to improve air quality can be triggered with a little help from the sun. Add some clever design, and you’re most of the way there. It’s already happening in famously smoggy Mexico City, where a hospital building called the Torre de Especialidades is shielded by an eye-catching 100-yard-long façade made with special tiles that have air-scrubbing abilities. 

The spectacular Palazzo Italia building in Milan is a smog-eating machine. Source: http://inhabitat.com/striking-palazzo-italia-at-the-milan-expo-is-a-smog-eating-machine/

<more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/smog-eating-buildings-battle-air-pollution-180954781/?no-ist; related links: https://www.alcoa.com/aap/north_america/pdf/ecoclean/EcoClean_Newsletter1.pdf (Smog-Eating Buildings? It's not science fiction. It’s not science fiction. It’s the innovative science behind Reynobond® with EcoClean.™  2011) and http://inhabitat.com/striking-palazzo-italia-at-the-milan-expo-is-a-smog-eating-machine/ (The spectacular Palazzo Italia building in Milan is a smog-eating machine. June 16, 2015)>