Re: [papercreters] Cool Roof - was - containers -was- Re: ugly eco home

Kim has stated the water is coming from the public water source, which means the water lines are under ground and are the mean ground temperature which, unless you're in a geothermal zone, will be significantly cooler than summertime air temps.  In Texas, near Houston, the average ground temperature should be somewhere between 54° and 64°, so the water is going to be between 25 and 40° cooler than the air temperature in the height of summer.

 

ElfN

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Pat

To: papercreters@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Sunday, September 02, 2007 1:24 PM

Subject: RE: [papercreters] Cool Roof - was - containers -was- Re: ugly eco home

Hey Kim,

You said "Put a piece of hot metal in water, it cools".  That's true if the water is cool.  If you put cool metal in hot water, the metal heats.  Seems to me that the water on the roof would work only if you keep the water cooler than the temperature of the metal on the roof.  You'd still get some cooling from evaporation of the water but I don't think it'd be enough to be noticeable.  I am interested in the cool roof technique because I was thinking of putting the water storage tanks (from a rain catchment system) underneath the house where it stays fairly cool in the summer and they'd be out of the way there as well.

Would the cool roof pictures and technical descriptions be on the Yahoo *Group* "HREG" home page?  I couldn't find the pictures, etc on the HREG Yahoo Group home page but maybe you have to be a member?  I'm really interested in the cool roof since I already have a metal roof….I'm supposing I'll need to install gutters and a tank to catch the run-off and then distribute it to the garden/flower beds/etc. but I've been wanting to build the rainwater catchment anyway… if I caught enough rainwater I wouldn't need to use as much city water, which would be a good thing!  San Antonio isn't *quite* as humid as the Houston area but close so if it works in Houston it should work here.

Your sprinklers run for 12 minutes/day total….how cool do you keep your house?  And how dry is it?  Do you notice that your towels and sheets stay damp?  These aren't challenging questions… they're something I'd really like to know before I invest time & money in a system I don't know if I can live with or not.  I really can't *stand* for my sheets to be damp.  That's the biggest problem I have with leaving the windows open at night in the spring when it's cool….it's usually also damp and it gets everything in the house damp.  EEEEyyyech!!!  J

Thanks!

Pat