Cool Roofs

Flickr via basykes:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/basykes/

A few days ago, New York City announced its “Cool Roofs” initiative, an effort to save energy by combining volunteerism and green design. According to the Mayor’s press release:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and former Vice President and founder of the Alliance for Climate Protection Al Gore today launched an NYC Service initiative, “NYC Cool Roofs,” to mobilize volunteers to coat the rooftops of participating buildings with reflective, white coating to reduce cooling costs, energy usage and greenhouse emissions… A cool roof absorbs 80 percent less heat than traditional dark colored roofs and can lower roof temperatures by up to 60 degrees and indoor temperatures by 10 to 20 degrees on hot days. The decrease in temperature reduces the need for air conditioning, lowering electric bills and reducing energy consumption.  Coating all eligible dark rooftops in New York City could result in up to a 1 degree reduction of New York City’s ambient air temperature – a significant and lasting change towards cooling the City.

While the city’s building code requires that new buildings include these types of roofs, the city has thousands of old structures that are not subject to these rules but could still be painted and help save energy. This is the low-hanging fruit of energy efficiency. The Mayor and his team should also be congratulated for integrating this program into the national effort to encourage greater volunteerism and public service.

However, in addition to the modest effort announced here, given the level of unemployment in the city and around the country, I wonder why we don’t take some of those billions of stimulus dollars still unspent and put a bunch of people to work painting roofs throughout America. We could start with public buildings, including the nation’s schools. Most people know how to paint or can be quickly trained, and it seems to me to be the kind of “shovel-ready” project that could do a lot of good in a hurry.