Cranking up the air conditioner is one way to keep buildings cool, but it guzzles energy. Passive materials can regulate interior temperatures more ef

Window coating reflects heat to cool buildings by 40 degrees

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2024-11-16 16:30:03

Cranking up the air conditioner is one way to keep buildings cool, but it guzzles energy. Passive materials can regulate interior temperatures more efficiently, and now scientists in South Korea have developed a new coating that keeps glass much cooler, while still being transparent.

Windows are great for filling rooms with natural light, but they’re also a major portal for messing with temperature. When it’s cold out, about 30% of the interior heat can escape through the windows, while in hotter times about 76% of the sunlight that hits windows enters as heat.

That’s why it’s important to plug this gap, ideally without ruining what makes windows appealing in the first place. A new coating, created by researchers at POSTECH and Korea University, could help do just that.

The team designed a material that can radiate heat away while allowing visible light to pass through. It’s made up of three layers that have different roles. The topmost layer is polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), which emits far-infrared radiation, which is felt as heat. The center is a thin layer of silver, which reflects most of the rest of the solar spectrum – however, it’s full of micro-scale holes, to allow visible light to pass through.

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