Jianying Hu, X. Yu
Oct 30, 2019
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0
Influential Citations
17
Citations
Journal
Construction and Building Materials
Abstract
Abstract A novel roofing system was designed to actively tailor solar heat gains in buildings, potentially reducing overall space heating and cooling energy needs and costs. The multifunctional films containing thermochromic materials and/or nano-TiO2 particles are featured with high solar reflectance throughout the entire solar spectrum and potential self-cleaning capacity. In this study, the novel roof system was designed by integrating multifunctional films with traditional roofing materials (aluminum, wood, plastics, and asphalt concrete). The optical characterization found that the solar reflectance value in the wavelength region of 300–1800 nm could reach up to 24–35% for individual multifunctional film whereas the value was 40%, 48%, 39%, and 40% for the roofing systems based on aluminum, wood, plastics, and asphalt concrete, respectively. The effectiveness of multifunctional films in modulating thermal performance of innovative roofing systems was experimentally examined. The experimental results demonstrated that the film containing both thermochromic materials and nano-TiO2 particles produced a drop in interior surface temperature as high as 3.5 °C for roofing system based on asphalt concrete and 9–10 °C for roofing system based on plastics. The proposed innovative roof systems have the potential for the reduction of heat absorption and cooling loads as well as mitigation of heat island effects.