White Roofs
View a video of previous US Energy Secretary Steven Chu on the benefits of silicone roofing systems or “white roofs.”
Steven Chu Pushes White Roofs In Fight Against Climate Change
Since being appointed as the Secretary of Energy, Dr. Steven Chu has been talking all about the benefits of white roofs. Now he’s going to put his own department where his mouth is by mandating that all new roofs on Energy Department buildings be either white or reflective.
White Roofs Catch On as Energy Cost Cutters
SAN FRANCISCO — Returning to their ranch-style house in Sacramento after a long summer workday, Jon and Kim Waldrep were routinely met by a wall of heat. “We’d come home in the summer, and the house would be 115 degrees, stifling,” said Mr. Waldrep, a regional manager for a national company. He or his wife […]
White Roofs Save Energy
The Associated Press reports that when the temperature on a roof is measured with an infrared gun, white roofs can be 45 degrees cooler than conventional dark-colored roofing material. This difference means cooler indoors that need less air conditioning to cool, which makes a building more energy efficient. This “cool roof” program has taken off […]
White Roofs Could Reduce Urban Heating
To help combat global warming and urban heating, we might just need to paint the town white. A new modeling study simulated the effects of painting roofs white to reflect incoming solar rays and found that it could help cool cities and reduce the effects of global warming. The feasibility of such an initiative for […]
White roofs cool energy bills
NEW YORK — Herb Van Gent points his infrared gun at a square of still-unpainted gray shingle and clicks the trigger. He gets an immediate temperature reading: 143 degrees and rising. Then he aims it five feet away to a square of roof I have just painted: 98 degrees and decreasing. He smiles. “A 45-degree […]
White roofs do cool temps, study finds
If every degree Fahrenheit counts in stabilizing the climate, then painting the roofs of city buildings white could offer a significant payoff, according to the first computer modeling study of an idea that’s taken hold in cities around the world. “Our research demonstrates that white roofs, at least in theory, can be an effective method […]
