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A team of engineers at Indiana’s Purdue University have created an “ultra-white” paint that is capable of reflecting up to 98.1% of sunlight, that could potentially negate the need for air conditioning and even reduce carbon emissions if used on a mass scale.
Developed as part of a six-year project, the researchers say that if the paint covered a 93sqm roof area it would be able to create a cooling power to ten kilowatts, far more powerful than domestic air conditioners.
The paint is made with a chemical compound called barium sulfate, that is used within cosmetics and photo paper to make them white. The barium sulfate particles are made up of different sizes which scatter sunrays and are able to cool immediate surrounding surfaces. The size of the particle determines how much light it scatters, so a wider range of particle sizes allows the paint to scatter more of the light spectrum from the sun.
In an effort to curb global warming, engineers have created the whitest paint ever made.
Coating buildings with this paint may one day cool them off enough to reduce the need for air conditioning, the researchers say.
In October, the team created an ultra-white paint that pushed limits on how white paint can be. Now they’ve outdone that. Not only is the new paint whiter, it can also can keep surfaces cooler than the formulation the researchers had previously demonstrated.
“If you were to use this paint to cover a roof area of about 1,000 square feet, we estimate that you could get a cooling power of 10 kilowatts. That’s more powerful than the central air conditioners used by most houses,” says Xiulin Ruan, professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University.
New Paint Formulation Keeps Surfaces Cooler than Previous Ultra-White Paints
Written by AZoBuildApr 16 2021
In an attempt to mitigate global warming, engineers from Purdue University have produced the world’s whitest paint.
An infrared camera shows how a sample of the whitest white paint (the dark purple square in the middle) actually cools the board below ambient temperature, something that not even commercial heat-rejecting paints do. Image Credit: Purdue University/Joseph Peoples.
According to the team, using this paint to coat buildings may someday cool them off sufficiently to decrease the requirement for air conditioning.
In October 2021, the researchers produced an ultra-white paint that pushed the limitations of the facet of white paints. Now, the team has exceeded those limitations. Not only is the newer paint whiter but it can also keep the surfaces cooler than the formulation previously demonstrated by the team.