Leaks in times of drought. Yes, the merchants at the Llibre Sunday market in the Sant Antoni neighborhood suffer from this surreal problem. The little rain that has recently fallen in Barcelona accumulates on the covers of the four pergolas arranged to protect their positions.
And, as Pablo Fernández, from the board of the booksellers' association on this side of the Eixample, explains, the Malay trickle down on merchandise is especially bloody when you are dedicated to selling books, comics and posters. Climate change is that cruel. It rains little, and when it does rain it seems like it rains too much.
“Let's see, it's true that all this seems very strange,” continues the bookseller Fernández. The thing is that these pergolas are from 2018, and the mere passage of time and the action of the elements eroded their roofs. August 27 fell on a Sunday. Then it rained a lot. It was a disaster. Those leaks were tremendous. It also rained on August 5, but by then most of them were already picking. Maybe it rains here five or six Sundays a year, lately with a lot of luck, but for us it is quite a drama. In addition, condensation also occurs.”
“And if the material gets wet, it is ruined forever,” bookseller Fernández continues to explain. A wet book is never recovered, even if it dries. And on those occasions the losses of each affected position can easily exceed 3,000 euros. Here we also sell copies for collectors. And if it rains on a Saturday it will most likely drip on you all Sunday morning. People make do with buckets or plastic tarps, but this way you lose visibility and exhibition space. Fortunately, the City Council listened to us from the beginning and apparently is finalizing a solution.”
The truth is that on this occasion the City Council is being unusually decisive. It even denotes a certain capacity for improvisation in the face of circumstances. The Institut Municipal de Mercats and the Eixample district immediately responded to the complaints from booksellers caused by the rains on August 27. Soon they installed layers of rubber intended to alleviate the problem until they found a definitive solution. And in the end, the municipal technicians modified the ongoing project to install photovoltaic panels on the pergolas of the bookstores so that they incorporate a PVC sheet to waterproof them.
The electrical energy generated thanks to the plates in question will be consumed by the market itself. The idea is to install 630 black 440 Wp modules on an area of 1,259 meters. The peak power of the installation will be 277.2 kWp. The City Council's final investment will be around 635,000 euros. The City Council will shortly explain the details of this project to booksellers. His idea is for the works to start during the spring.
The socialist Jordi Valls, deputy mayor for Economic Promotion and also councilor responsible for the Eixample district, is very satisfied with the evolution of this initiative.
"This is a project to implement a renewable self-consumption energy generation system in a municipal facility that we adapt to respond to another problem related to climate change, such as episodes of intense rain, which are increasingly frequent," details the Valls himself. All of this is part of the commitment to move towards climate neutrality and the decarbonization of the city and in the effort that the City Council is making to introduce energy-saving improvements in municipal facilities such as markets.”
