Urban Heat Island Effect
An urban heat island occurs where the combination of heat-absorbing infrastructure such as dark asphalt parking lots and road pavement and expanses of black rooftops, coupled with sparse vegetation, raises air temperature by 1 to 3°C higher than the temperature in the surrounding countryside.
Green building programs advocate the use of cool roofing to mitigate the urban heat island effect and the resulting poorer air quality (in the form of smog) the effect causes. By reflecting sunlight, light-colored roofs minimize the temperature rise and reduce cooling energy use and smog formation. A study by LBNL showed that, if strategies to mitigate this effect, including cool roofs, were widely adopted, the Greater Toronto metropolitan area could save more than $11 million annually on energy costs.
Read more about this topic: Cool Roof
Famous quotes containing the words urban, heat, island and/or effect:
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—John Berger (b. 1926)
“And oh, I knew, I knew,
And said out loud, I couldn’t bide the smother
And heat so close in; but the thought of all
The woods and town on fire by me, and all
The town turned out to fight for me that held me.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
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—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
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—Susan Lapinski (20th century)