How Do White Roofs Reduce Smog

A lighter colored roof will reflect as much as 80 percent of the solar radiation that hits your house back into space.

How do white roofs reduce smog. A white roof project is low cost easy to implement relieves stress on the power grid cuts down on smog and creates tangible change for individuals our communities and even globally reports the group which is looking to expand its work across the country significantly in 2013 and expand internationally in 2014. In metropolitan areas white roofs also help reduce smog levels by lowering city temperatures. Don t jump on the white roof bandwagon just yet however. But new research indicates that making surfaces more light reflecting can have a significant impact on lowering extreme temperatures not just in cities but in rural areas as well.

Black roofing is also responsible for heating our waterways. The latter tends to be higher in urban areas due to the mass heat absorption from paved roads. In 2017 more than 3 000 city rooftops were painted using both white lime and a special reflective coating. It has long been known that installing white roofs helps reduce heat buildup in cities.

The drawback of white roofs. A white or at least light colored roof provides two benefits. In urban areas white roofs also help lower smog levels by lowering local temperatures which tend to be higher due to the large proportion of paved surfaces. The study concludes by stating that the rate of smog formation increases exponentially with temperature and that making the switch to white roofing would reduce smog by 10 percent in urban areas which is the equivalent of removing three to five million cars from the roads.

This roof type may not be as eco friendly as meets the eye. Critics have suggested white roofs do.