Paint the world's roofs white and Global Warming will be forestalled!

Yeah, it's a great idea. You can really see how focused on long term solutions this guy is.

Painting the roofs white will infact reduce cooling costs this summer, because the roofs won't heat up as much. It's a great plan!

Until October. When it starts to get cold. Maybe cooling off the houses wasn't such a good idea - now we'll have to turn the heat up, because less solar energy is going towards heating the house.

Hmmm, so I guess then we should paint our roofs black in October, and white in April. It's a perfect plan! We can save a few bucks a month on our electricity bills!

Oh, wait, you mean paint isn't free? It takes natural resources and energy just to produce paint in the first place? No fuckin' way, dude!

I got it! We should just get a gray roof that reflects some heat in summer, and absorbs some heat in winter. It's not perfect, but it doesn't require repainting every 6 months - a well made roof should last for decades.

I'm going to run out and buy a gray roof! Oh wait - I already fucking have one.

I hate the shortsightedness when it comes to emissions. Eco-freaks are quick to point at the end result "hey brother, your maxima burns more gas than my prius, dude. that's like, um, against mother nature. you need to shift your karmic energys... want to drink some green tea and soymilk and smoke some herb?"
Without actually analyzing things from start to finish - namely, the energy required for production, and the energy required for destruction. The Prius doesn't pop out of thin air - It's made in a factory. How much power does it take to make it? What about the lithium batteries? Are they efficient to mass-produce? What about once the car has reached the end of its service life? Can the batteries be recycled the same way a car's engine can be sold as scrap metal to be melted down and reused, or do they need an expensive, high-power treatment to either reuse them or to throw them away safely? These are questions that I have yet to hear a satisfactory answer from them, and until I do, I'm not convinced that hybrid cars are a remotely good idea.
 
I ain't much on the g-warming debate junk, but I do like lower bills.

I'd like to have a light metal roof, but the price hasn't gotten right...yet....in the last ten years.
When I had this house re-roofed, and even some decking replace, and labor,
it was still half price of metal, even if I do the labor.
 
The most efficient roof, regardless of color, is a dual roof. The first roof is the normal roof as we have them now. The second roof is built about 10" - 12" above the first roof with an airspace between. The upper roof shades the lower roof and the heat from the upper roof is carried away by convection of the air between them.

In the winter, the sides of the two roofs can be sealed off which forms a plenum. The heat from the upper roof is trapped in the plenum and can be pumped into the living space through convection or with a fan.

The darker the upper roof is, the more convection is created between the roofs. The living space stays warm in winter and cool in summer. It would be laborious to do but one could change the color of the upper roof to light in summer and dark in winter to increase efficiency.
 
Guess that means I, personally, am more environmentally friendly than you young folks. After all...my hair is turning white...:rolleyes:
 
jimpeel said:
The most efficient roof, regardless of color, is a dual roof. The first roof is the normal roof as we have them now. The second roof is built about 10" - 12" above the first roof with an airspace between. The upper roof shades the lower roof and the heat from the upper roof is carried away by convection of the air between them.

In the winter, the sides of the two roofs can be sealed off which forms a plenum. The heat from the upper roof is trapped in the plenum and can be pumped into the living space through convection or with a fan.

The darker the upper roof is, the more convection is created between the roofs. The living space stays warm in winter and cool in summer. It would be laborious to do but one could change the color of the upper roof to light in summer and dark in winter to increase efficiency.
Click to expand...

that's what we have now....
an 'enclosed' double wide w/3 extensions, and full footing.
Different pitch now with about a foot and a half clearance in the crown,
tapering down to about 6 inch at the lower/gutter edges, in relation to the old roof.
Seems to work way better than the old days.
I'm still paying on that loan.
 
jimpeel said:
The most efficient roof, regardless of color, is a dual roof. The first roof is the normal roof as we have them now. The second roof is built about 10" - 12" above the first roof with an airspace between. The upper roof shades the lower roof and the heat from the upper roof is carried away by convection of the air between them.

In the winter, the sides of the two roofs can be sealed off which forms a plenum. The heat from the upper roof is trapped in the plenum and can be pumped into the living space through convection or with a fan.

The darker the upper roof is, the more convection is created between the roofs. The living space stays warm in winter and cool in summer. It would be laborious to do but one could change the color of the upper roof to light in summer and dark in winter to increase efficiency.
Click to expand...

Sounds spendy, but it reminds me of another energy-saver that I've got in the works. A twinned hot-water tank. One is the main tank with heating elements and the other is an uninsulated smaller tank with no elements. The smaller tank uses the house's ambiant temperature to bring the water from near freezing in the winter, to 'room temperature' before it enters the larger tank. Less heating to bring it up to useable temperature. Very nice... if my calcs are right, I should save 15-25% on costs alone.
 
MrBishop said:
Sounds spendy, but it reminds me of another energy-saver that I've got in the works. A twinned hot-water tank. One is the main tank with heating elements and the other is an uninsulated smaller tank with no elements. The smaller tank uses the house's ambiant temperature to bring the water from near freezing in the winter, to 'room temperature' before it enters the larger tank. Less heating to bring it up to useable temperature. Very nice... if my calcs are right, I should save 15-25% on costs alone.
Click to expand...


Or you could just go tankless and save even more.
 
I dunno - I've heard stories from both sides of the fence re: those. Roughly 2-3x the price of a tank.
 
They are pricey as hell but pay for themselves in short order.
Certainly much quicker in cold climates.
Bishy you heat water with natural gas Right.
Hear tell they have been nearly standard issue in Europe for years.
Living in the desert, I’ve never been able to justify the cost.
 
Winky said:
They are pricey as hell but pay for themselves in short order.
Certainly much quicker in cold climates.
Bishy you heat water with natural gas Right.
Hear tell they have been nearly standard issue in Europe for years.
Living in the desert, I’ve never been able to justify the cost.
Click to expand...
Nope...hydro-electric, actually...but you may have a point, re: the ROI for it.

Prof: I've seen them running in Spain.... quiet and efficient, from all I've seen. Short on water pressure, though I'm not sure if that's because of the local water pressure or something in the design. As for the circuit, I'll have to look at my box downstairs to see if I've got any available
 
Bish .... it ain't that easy. Follow this. You cook with electric, right? Heat with it too, as I recall. Now, your standard water heater is a 20 amp circuit. Perhaps you're even running it on a 15A. Your stove is probably 20-30A. Dryer may be 15-20A Then add all the circuits for the baseboards ... perhaps 15A for three. How many amps are you up to? Then add your usual suspects, tv, fridge, lights, washer etc. Now this is your normal load. Frequently this will surpass your main breaker (anywhere from 60-200A) by as much as 50% and still be within code, since it's assumed that not everything is going to be running simultaneously. To replace the hot water tank with an inline, you need to bung another 25A into the middle of that. Depending on how tight you already were, that may put you outside code. At the very least, it may cause you to pop the main in the middle of winter when you're doing the laundry while supper's in the oven.

If, on the other hand, you're panel isn't original and was upgraded, you might find that adding up all the circuits doesn't even total the main, in which case, you're in the butter zone.

then you need to calculate the water usage. How big a heater do you need? Take a 5 gallon pail and fill it in the tub, or from your laundry outlet. That's really the two places you need to measure from, since those are the biggest users. That'll tell you what amperage you need to have. Then you need to consider how much room temp water you're gonna have to push outta the way. As I recall, your hot water tank is very close to the bathroom, but completely on the other side of the house from the laundry and kitchen. A situation like that might well warrant considering installing two separate heaters, one close to each. But unless you were factoring in showering and doing laundry at the same time, they'd probably both need to be equally substantial. Doing it that way is brilliant in new construction, since you can save half the copper pipe and only run the cold all the way to the target. That goes a long way towards paying for the large guage copper wire needed to feed those beasties.
 
I saw a tankless gas-fired one for I think $600 or $700. The capacity isn't that much but for me living in a single-wide trailer it would work fine. That's close enough to the cost of a normal water heater that it would be worthwhile for me to convert when this water heater goes out... of course, it has a build date of 2005 so it's probably got a lot of years left.
 
Professur said:
Bish .... it ain't that easy. Follow this. You cook with electric, right? Heat with it too, as I recall. Now, your standard water heater is a 20 amp circuit. Perhaps you're even running it on a 15A. Your stove is probably 20-30A. Dryer may be 15-20A Then add all the circuits for the baseboards ... perhaps 15A for three. How many amps are you up to? Then add your usual suspects, tv, fridge, lights, washer etc. Now this is your normal load. Frequently this will surpass your main breaker (anywhere from 60-200A) by as much as 50% and still be within code, since it's assumed that not everything is going to be running simultaneously. To replace the hot water tank with an inline, you need to bung another 25A into the middle of that. Depending on how tight you already were, that may put you outside code. At the very least, it may cause you to pop the main in the middle of winter when you're doing the laundry while supper's in the oven.

If, on the other hand, you're panel isn't original and was upgraded, you might find that adding up all the circuits doesn't even total the main, in which case, you're in the butter zone.

then you need to calculate the water usage. How big a heater do you need? Take a 5 gallon pail and fill it in the tub, or from your laundry outlet. That's really the two places you need to measure from, since those are the biggest users. That'll tell you what amperage you need to have. Then you need to consider how much room temp water you're gonna have to push outta the way. As I recall, your hot water tank is very close to the bathroom, but completely on the other side of the house from the laundry and kitchen. A situation like that might well warrant considering installing two separate heaters, one close to each. But unless you were factoring in showering and doing laundry at the same time, they'd probably both need to be equally substantial. Doing it that way is brilliant in new construction, since you can save half the copper pipe and only run the cold all the way to the target. That goes a long way towards paying for the large guage copper wire needed to feed those beasties.
Click to expand...

I've got a 'new' panel. Placed about 13 years ago, when I first bought the place. Used to be fuses.. :p I'll have to give it a look see.

What we currently have is a 60gal tank that's getting old. One of the burners went out...we replaced it. The second went out and tried to replace that one too. I noticed a chunk of sediment when I was emptying the tank the first time... I'm worried a bit about the integrity of the tank, but I don't have an integrated dipstick that I can pull and gaze at to see how it's likely to be inside.

We're pretty good at staggering high-demand applications so we don't overlap. The odd laundering while cooking supper, but more the exception than the rule. You're right in the placement of the tank re: the rest of the house.

I'm afraid that I don't get your reference re: a 5 gal pail of water and amperage.
 
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