5 Tips For A Cool Commercial Flat Roof
Cool roofs do not absorb as much heat as other roofing options, which means your building is less likely to heat up in the summer. This can result in lower cooling costs and a lower energy usage impact on your bottom line.
1. Choose a Light Color
The color of the roof is the main thing that affects solar heat gain. A dark-colored roof, such as an asphalt roof, absorbs more heat and creates a heat island effect the causes a localized temperature increase. Instead, opt for light-colored membrane roofs, or have a light-colored roofing foam applied over the surface of an existing dark-colored roof.
2. Keep It Clean
Roofs must remain light in color to continue reflecting the sun's heat. Dirt and dust will collect on the roof's surface over time, darkening it and causing more heat gain. You can schedule a spring roof cleaning to increase heat reflectivity before summer. The optimum time to have the roof cleaned is right before your annual roof inspection. This way it's also easier to inspect the roof.
3. Increase Ventilation
A poorly ventilated commercial roof allows hot air to build up inside your building instead of escaping through the vents. This is because hot air rises and becomes trapped in the ceiling spaces if there are no vents to flow out of. The most common causes of poor ventilation are dirty, blocked vents, or an insufficient number of vents on the roof. A roofer must inspect your ventilation system and determine whether the vents need to be serviced or if more vents are necessary.
4. Insulate Well
Good roof insulation reduces heat gain in the building and prevents cooler air from escaping through the walls and roof. The best time to insulate is during roof installation since your roofer will have full access during the teardown to install further installation. For an existing roof, there are insulated spray foam coatings that can be applied over the roofing surface to help increase the insulation values of the roof.
5. Apply a Coating
UV reflective coatings can be applied to any roof material. They decrease solar heat gain for both dark and light-colored roofs by reflecting more of the UV radiation from the sun. Coatings need to be applied to clean roofs that are in good repair.
Contact a roofing contractor in your area to learn more about keeping your commercial roof cool.
Can you imagine hammering away at shingles from dawn until dusk? If this sounds like fun, then you may have a future in the roofing industry. If this does not sound fun at all, then you're going to be someone who calls a roofing company and leave the work to the professionals. There's nothing wrong with that. Roofing is hard and dangerous; it's definitely not for everyone. In fact, we don't climb up on the roof ourselves. We do, however, write about roofing on this blog. We consider that to be a small service we can do for homeowners who are interested in roofing and want to know more.