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Exactly correct! Also, you could definitely do well to reduce your roof albedo by switching to white/reflective roofs. This point has been made endlessly over

Exactly correct! Also, you could definitely do well to reduce your roof albedo by switching to white/reflective roofs. This point has been made endlessly over the last 30-40 years. No one actually does it. People are actually installing solar panels.

crazygringo 3y ago
> No one actually does it. To the contrary -- at least in NYC it's extremely common. The vast majority of "tenement" apartment buildings have silver roofs, for this reason. Just fire up Google Maps in satellite view over Manhattan and see for yourself. White-looking roofs everywhere (but silver in reality). New construction with roof decks tends to use things like white-ish floor squares as well. They're obviously much cooler to walk on in the summer. (While, sadly, contrary to your assertion, virtually nobody is installing solar panels in NYC. Landlords don't seem very interested so far.)
- wolverine876 3y ago
  Why silver and not white?
  - crazygringo 3y ago
    Good question. I can't easily find an answer, but this page at least seems to describes the type of silver roof common on old NYC buildings: https://flatroofdoc.com/silver-coating-protecting-a-rubber-roof/amp/ https://flatroofdoc.com/silver-coating-protecting-a-rubber-r... Elsewhere I find a claim that the aluminum paint used was a 20th century thing, but now white paint is preferred as being more reflective.
andsoitis 3y ago
> No one actually does it. Los Angeles has building codes for cool roofs: https://www.ladbs.org/docs/default-source/publications/ordinances/cool-roof-fact-sheet-and-faq.pdf?sfvrsn=10 https://www.ladbs.org/docs/default-source/publications/ordin...