Paint Your Roof White to Save Energy

Here's a quick tip to keep your home cooler and thus bring your energy bill down. Paint your roof white. It's been mentioned by the new Energy Secretary Steven Chu and supported by Barack Obama that if we were to paint 30 billion square feet of commercial roof space in the United States white, it would be the equivalent of taking 75 million cars off the road for a year. As white roofs can stay up to 30% cooler in the summer.

This is big idea thinking meant to slowdown global warming but if we take it to a micro-level it certainly couldn't hurt our own energy bill.

Tom Silva of This Old House agrees that changing the reflectivity of your roof will keep your home cooler and he recommends painting your roof with a white elastomeric coating and foregoing the ones containing insulating beads as they've been proven to be just as effective as the non-bead paint.

Hat tip ~ Andrew Sullivan

photo: Runder

Charles & Hudson | Comments () |

GardenShed

Roof painting with white color is really quite benefit for home owners because white color is protect from sun hit. White color is mostly beneficial in energy saving from painting on roof because white color prevent a direct sun heat so it keep home temperature good and it help to energy bill decrease. It's really a effective for global warming.

Wall tiles

The floor tiles are the best choice to the interior decoration of the bathroom. The floor tiles gives an outstanding look to the home. The floor tiles have a number of designs and all the designs are unique. I like this site!

Kermit Lukacs

Wow, this is very useful information, but I think white can be a bit more expensive since you have to maintain its color through the years. Is this cheaper than repainting every 2 or 3 years? I would love to try this idea. Thanks! :)

Terence Watthens

The reason is because white attracts less light compared to other colors. The darker the shade of your roof, the more likely it will get hot.

Santo Badenoch

I'm surprised to learn that painting roofs white can help us save on our HVAC usage. Cooling our roofs by simply changing the paint color can surely go a long way. Aside from saving electricity, this can also help preserve the environment for future generations.

-Santo Badenoch

Joseph Falco

Elastometric has been proven not to work on asphalt shingles. Be careful before ruining a roof. I used Type S slaked lime ($8 for 50lbs) and water with a roller brush. Just like Tom Sawyer. One part lime to 3 parts water and once it dries you'll need sunglasses to look at it. You will have a roof coated with crystalline calcium. As in bone. It dropped the temperature inside the attic about 10 degrees. How do I know? I put a temp probe up there which is connected wirelessly to a digital weather station thermometer. BTW, I am in Texas, so I am motivated regarding heat.

Paint Your Roof White to Save Energy

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