Energy and Comfort Benefits of a Cool Roof Application in a Non-Residential Building Belonging to Roma Tre University

Abstract

Abstract:The Mediterranean architecture was characterized by passive solutions able to ensure thermal comfort conditions in the built environment during the hot season. This cultural heritage is almost disappeared, delegating the comfort conditions to artificial systems. One of the above mentioned passive solutions concerns the use of light colors to redirect most of the incident solar radiation. Cool roofs are a mix of these old concepts and modern technologies. The paper reports the results of a cool roof application in a senior recreation center, belonging to Roma Tre University. The cool roof was applied on a part of the whole surface of the roof in order to assess the difference in thermal conditions obtained with this solution compared to the original case. The experiment was carried out in two phases. During the first phase the building was monitored with sensors of temperature, humidity and solar radiation. The second phase concerned the creation of a building model inputted in a dynamic simulation tool used to evaluate the building performances due to this cooling technique. This study demonstrate the positive impact of the technology in terms of cooling and total energy savings as well as on the indoor thermal conditions in Mediterranean buildings.

Preliminary studies of a cool roofs' energy-rating system in Italy

“…Besides, it is important to emphasise that the performance of the roof surface also depends on the thermal emissivity that drives the radiative exchanges of the roof with the sky and the surrounding objects. Several studies were carried out during the past years and showed the potentialities and limits of the technology by means of numerical analyses (Akbari, Bretz, Kurn, & Hartford, 1997;Christen & Vogt, 2004;Suehrcke, Peterson, & Selby, 2008;Synnefa, Santamouris, & Akbari, 2007;Zinzi, 2010) and monitoring in real buildings (Bozonnet, Doya, & Allard, 2011;Carnielo, Fanchiotti, & Zinzi, 2011;Kolokotroni, Gowreesunker, & Giridharan, 2011;Kolokotsa, Diakaki, Papantoniou, & Vlissidis, 2011;Paolini et al, 2013;Parker et al, 1998;Romeo & Zinzi, 2011;Synnefa, Saliari, & Santamouris, 2012;Zinzi, Carnielo, & Agnoli, 2012).…”

A Study on the Influence of the Next Generation Colored Inorganic Geopolymer Material Paint on the Insulation Measurement of Concrete Building Shell

“…Further findings showed that not only could the shades of the paint color affect the reflection of the sunlight, when phase change materials were added to the paints under constant temperature conditions, they could also change the state of matter and provide latent heat to achieve thermal insulation [14]. Some researchers studied the paints with reflection and heat insulation by applying them to a wide variety of buildings and roads [15][16][17][18]. There were also studies on the use of white cement paint, high-gloss reflective gray or white paints, and environmental afforestation on the building rooftops, all aimed to accelerate the light-reflecting of the sunlight.…”