The idea of going green sounds good. So many lofty ideas that will save energy and money- what a great idea--however- the cost is high and savings won't be realized for many years.
One of the craziest ideas is painting the roofs white- to reflect heat and cool homes.
This might be a good idea if you live in an area that is extremely warm most of the year.
However in the Northeast and in our Midatlantic area it would be impractical.
In Maryland we have more cooler months than hot months- the heat is on for more months than the air conditioner.
Judging from the number of complaints from the past week with our temps in the 50's and residents complaining how cold it was- white roofs would probably have give these people frost bite.
White roofs in the winter would hinder snow melting- those buildings with flat roofs( Americana Finnmark) would be subjected to colder temps in the winter with the snow not melting and even the remore possibilty of a roof collapse if the weight increases from the failure of a snow melt.
Another drawback is the time it takes to warm a unit vs. cooling
a unit- warming your unit will usually take longer-(more wasted energy.
As for solar panels- they are expensive, the conversion from our current source of energy to solar is expensive- they are not reliable.
Geothermal is not practical in our area- we have the Metro running underground, and the problem of underground springs
One of the reasons the Forest Glen Metro is so deep is due to underground springs- we could not dig deep enough to get the geothermal energy we need.
With recent discoveries of natural gas in the midwest I expect the price of natural gas to be reduced- our heat is natural gas-so we may see some savings here- as for the a/c in the summer- if everyone had a dehumidifier in their home they would use less a/c.
An air conditioner is basically a large dehumifier- it removes moisture from the air causing the areas to be cool.
