White Roofs

Spreading awareness about a cheap, effective, and easy solution to curb climate change in NYC.

Get Started

What is a white roof?

A white roof or cool roof is a roof that is painted with special white solar reflective paint. This paint helps reflect about 90% of sunlight. Urban areas are more impacted by climate change. Places such as New York City have certain features that cause them to be hotter on average such as asphalt roads, tar roofs, and other artificial surfaces that absorb heat from the sun, creating an urban heat island effect. These effects vary from more heat-related deaths and diseases to higher energy consumption to cool homes. This matter worsens at night. The temperature in a city can be up to 22°F hotter than nearby suburbs. This makes the environment within cities worse for people as they are likely to have difficulty enduring hotter temperatures. Therefore, implementing white roofs would improve the quality of life in NYC as white roofs help offset climate change. It will also make NYC a cooler city and allow buildings to save energy and money through spending 50% less on electricity for air conditioning during the summer time.

The Problem

Climate change is a real problem. 2015 was the hottest year on record. Today, Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets are shedding about 125 billion tons of ice per year. Hurricanes, wildfires, and other natural disasters are occuring more frequently due to climate change.

Cooler

Solar-reflective white paint reflects up to 90% of sunlight as opposed to the 20% reflected by a traditional black roof. Making NYC a much cooler city.

Safer

Implementing white roofs would have the same climate benefits as taking all the world's cars off the road for 10 years.

How You Can Help

Donate

Donate to White Roof Initiative. An Organization that increases the number of white roofs.

Petition

Sign the following petition to Mayor Bill De Blasio to implement a policy for white roofs.

Appeal

Appeal to your CUNY school president to work with NYC CoolRoofs. NYC CoolRoofs provides no-cost installation of white roofs for all schools, colleges, and universities.