Reducing the heat from our air conditioners and other machinery might seem like a simple solution, but according to the computer model, that wouldn’t really help much because anthropogenic heat isn’t a huge factor. Tackling the big contributors—convection efficiency and heat storage—however, isn’t a practical solution “because it would require fundamental changes to the urban morphology,” Zhao and colleagues note. What would help, though, is increasing the reflectiveness of the city, they say. That would decrease the amount of heat the city absorbs during the day and even help indirectly at night, by decreasing the amount of heat available to be released after the sun goes down. Plus, it’s easy—flat city roofs can be painted white or another reflective color. White roofs also have additional benefits, such as reducing energy use because not as much air conditioning is needed to balance out the heat absorbed by buildings. And lowering energy use also means lowering carbon emissions—a perk that extends beyond the dynamics of one urban heat island.
Posted on: Sun, 13 Jul 2014 04:05:05 +0000
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