Good idea, but why stop at a mere 100 major cities?

Do their calculations include the additional heat gain (air conditioning load) created by the reflectance? I couldn't find any mention of it in any of the linked documents.

Denier in Chief: Your insults did nothing to provide me with the global warming issues we are talking about. You did prove you are a AGW denier.
Nothing was cut or pasted below. It was studied by me from reading books. Your perjorative remarks, reflect more about who you are, not who I am.
1.What relationship does CO2 have with Global Warming.
2.How does CO2 react to heat(IR).
3.Why is Venus so hot in it's relative distance from the Sun.
4. How much CO2 is absorbed by the Earth, and how much is in the Atmosphere.
5.How much CO2 is sequetered in the biosphere and oceans, and if it is not totally absorbed, where does the excess go.
6.Why are Scientists pumping cold water from the bottom of the sea. Why are scientists dropping fertilized, and seeded tree starter darts, where there is deforestation.What is CO2 sequestration.
7.What happens to the ecosystem when you kill forests or fill carbon sinks.
8. Why is the sea warming, our Planet warming, and the Arctic melting,AKA Rapid climate change.
Why not add to this blog and not use disinformation, and verbal abuse. Back up your own facts, not that you have ever offered any.
I think anyone here would be willing to help our Planet, in their own way. You have raised some doubts. Even if you were are skeptic, you would not talk to me like an Idiot. If you want to be like Rush than you shouldn't post junk here. This is a global warming debate. Now, answer these questions. Sir; KIPP

It's certainly all right with me as long as it's cost effective and doesn't mandate people do things they don't want to do. It could lower cooling cost by reducing the heat load for most buildings on a sunny day. This idea could make sense in a lot of places.

If they put a highly reflective surface on our roads and highways, we'll have to remember our sunglasses.

BTW, is this an actual admission by the warmistas that the UHI effect is real?

If they used lower albedo materials to change everything to cool roofs & cool parking lots they would have no place to put all the weather stations!!!! They might have to locate them in fields or something equally drastic.

I was amused to note that Lewis Gordon Pugh, who set out to paddle a kayak to the Pole to demonstrate the vanishing of the Arctic ice, had to turn back 600 miles short of his goal. At 80.5 degrees north, he met with ice so thick that he and his fossil-fuelled support ship could not go on. But this did not prevent him boasting that he had travelled "further north than anyone has kayaked so far�. I know it is jolly unsporting of me to point this out but the Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen in 1893 found the Arctic so ice-free that he was able to kayak above 82 degrees north, 100 miles nearer the Pole than this hapless campaigner against "unprecedented global warming�. I also note there has also been an acclaimed new paper by Michael Mann, the creator of the iconic "hockey stick" graph, purporting to show that the world has recently become hotter than at any time in recorded history. It pains me to observe that, as in his original graph, he has eliminated the wealth of evidence to show that temperatures were higher in the Medieval Warm Period than today. Of course this will not prevent Mann's new study being used in the IPCC international conference in Copenhagen next year to agree a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. Why should scientific facts be allowed to get in the way of a good story. Meanwhile, back in the real world, temperatures continue to drop. The latest NASA satellite readings on global temperatures from the University of Alabama, one of four officially recognised sources of temperature data, show that August was the fourth month this year when temperatures fell below average since satellite records began 30 years ago. The US National Climatic Data Center shows is showing that last month in the USA was only the 39th warmest since records began 113 years ago. Figures for US surface temperatures show that the hottest decade of the 20th century was not the 1990s as is often claimed by GW lobby but the 1930s. Of course this is only of limited interest since the "bien pensant" hear what they want to hear and disregard the rest.

Reply: This comment sounds very familar, was this taken from a very recent telegraph article?

Great idea, except that the earth is cooling, not warming.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/from:2003/trend/plot/rss/from:2003/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:2003/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2003/trend

Frankly, I do not see this as any sort of good idea.

I mean, what's the point?

We have been told for years that cities play no role in warming the planet, that city located thermometers are not affected by either asphalt, roofs, or mechanical venting, and that the sole cause of warming is the increase in CO2 concentration from humans burning fossil fuels.

Therefore, changing the albedo, since it does nothing to change the amount of CO2 put into the atmosphere, will not make any difference to climate change.

Now, on the other hand, if you don't buy into Gore, doing this might be a great idea. While the results would not do a thing to change global climate, it will, on the other hand, really cause the reading at thermometers to go down. Therefore, the supposed "effect" will be to "fix" global warming.

Another very eminent scientist urging us to wake up...

Roll back time to safeguard climate, expert warns

Professor John Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, told the Guardian that only a return to pre-industrial levels of CO2 would be enough to guarantee a safe future for the planet.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/15/climatechange.carbonemissions

This may be helpful during periods of warming but what do we do in periods of cooling? Since the subject of this blog is "climate change" (even though it is billed as "global warming") then proposed solutions need to consider both extremes, not just the one the alarmists have adopted as their favorite. If we have learned anything at all about our climate then we certainly know that it changes in both directions. We have the historical record on which to base that fact as evidenced by the MWP and LIA. It would be foolish to only plan for warming when cooling is just as likely. The most recent climate data points to a period of cooling so I will delay my roofing projects until the temperature trend becomes clearer. I may need to find heat absorbing roofing materials if we are indeed entering a cooling phase.

Until there is some credible scientific evidence to support the notion that man-made increases in CO2 cause climatic warming then we shouldn't jump to that conclusion. Any hypothesis which relies so heavily on proxy data and computer models is unlikely to be validated by reality.

rick wrote:
"If they used lower albedo materials to change everything to cool roofs & cool parking lots they would have no place to put all the weather stations!!!! They might have to locate them in fields or something equally drastic."

LOL!!!
Good one.

Just a quick question relating to this issue. Why can't a color additive say "white for example" be added to asphalt roadways. The color black is the absolute worst color for a number of reasons.

1)Black absorbs the most heat and cause asphalt roadways to buckle during very hot weather. Thus shortening the life of the roadway.

2) It absolutely heats up the immediate area, look at airports for instance, the temperature there is always hotter then the surrounding nearby areas due to all the black asphalt. Try walking on black asphalt with bare feet on a sunny summer day. Then walk on the white strip seperating the lanes, I'm guessing about a 30 degree cooling difference?

3) I believe the color black holds the heat the longest (although I could be wrong about that) allowing less time for radiation cooling.

With millions of miles of roadway the simple and very easily implemented idea of using a white colorant WOULD have an immediate cooling (or less heating) effect on the environment. Where as the theory of cutting CO2 emmisions MIGHT have a cooling or less heating effect 50 years down the road. Unless I am completely stupid, it seems like a no brainer to me to use a lighter color roadway and have a definite immediate effect as opposed arguing about CO2 and what might happen 50 or 100 years from now from cutting CO2 emmissions.

Anybody care to comment or enlighten me about my thoughts?

Reply: White roadways could cause a major glare problem for motorists, especially mid-morning and late afternoon. Similar to snow with skiers.

This is another example of a field of study not paying attention to the little things of what their brilliant solutions would result in.
“We need to make more concrete to reflect the suns rays and lower temperatures”
Correct me if I am wrong but I thought CONCRETE was a major source of CO2 emissions because of all the energy used in its production?
Nope I’m not wrong! Best estimates in 6 reference books say Concrete currently is responsible for 7-10% of manmade production of CO2.
So if CO2 is the devil incarnate why would we want to make more CO2?
LOL the brilliance of ideas in the Universe of AGW without looking at the ramifications of their solutions is truly astounding. Will somebody on the AGW side use their head for something besides bowing to Dr. Hansen!
If only Gilder Radner were alive to play Roseanne Roseannadanna on “Saturday Night Live” we could have heard her say after reading this article, “This just goes to show you, If it’s not one thing it’s……..”
How about we THINK before saying “We HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!”
Remember “First! Do no harm”

They can paint their roofs white down south if they want - I just redid mine in a nice charcoal shade to reduce my heating bills in the winter. What next? Flip-over shingles that are black in winter and white in summer? Countering a problem that has not been proven to exist is a hallmark of AGW.

Dr. C mentions Michael Mann's latest hockey stick. Having Mann produce this after his original was proven to be statistical nonsense is like having a company convicted of tax fraud auditing their own books. I guess that's what passes for 'peer review' in those circles.

Chris V: As noted in my above comment, the additional reflectance (glare) of "white" roadways and nearby roofs would impose an additional solar load on existing buildings, primarily those with glass exterior walls, increasing their air conditioning costs and power consumption. If the A/C systems weren't designed for this additional load, they would not be able to accommodate it and spaces would overheat. I found nothing in the paper that mentions how they compensate for this or that they even considered this. They only deal with heat gains and losses through the roof.

And yes, this used to happen all the time when a developer threw up a building with reflective glass or other reflective properties. The neighboring structures bore the brunt, and lawsuits resulted.

Patrick

I like the 'woodfortrees' website. Change the start date, change the trend.....everyone should have a go.

I saw some of the second part of the BBC programme Earth: The Climate Wars, which set out to answer the critics of AGW. Among the claims made by the programme's presenter were:

1) Mann's 'hockey stick' graph has been confirmed by more recent studies using a wider variety of proxies. Some of the new graphs do show a slight warming during the Medieval Warm Period, (presumably this is meant to 'prove' their accuracy).

2) The satellite temperature data is flawed because the decay of the satellites' orbits reduces their altitude, which causes their sensors to give lower temperature readings. The timing of their passes also alters, causing them to confuse daytime and nighttime readings. The recent 'cooling' is therefore not really happening.

As the programme's finale, a 'leading climate change sceptic' (I forget his name) was shown addressing a conference. In his opening sentences he said there had been two periods of warming during the 20th century, an early one (I presume this was the 1920s-30s) and a later one which he said was at least partly the result of human influence. The start of the speaker's next sentence was also heard, from which it was obvious that he was going to qualify what he had just said. However, at that point the programme's editors cut back to their own presenter, who said something along the lines of, 'See, even the sceptics now admit that the climate is warming and humans are to blame.' This looked to me like a deliberate attempt to misrepresent the speaker's true position.

Any comments?

Tell me if I missed the point here or if most of the comments by other readers have missed the point. This does not sound like it is a solution to the actual temperature change being observed, but rather a solution to reduce the portion of the heat trapped in cities. How much of the earth's surface can 100 major cities possibly cover? I can't imagine that it is enough to change the average global temperature. Also, as Brett pointed out in response to one comment, a highly reflective material on the ground would create chaos with the glare.

Along those lines, has any consideration been giving to the blinding glare that would be given off by major cities that could be dangerous to pilots, especially of small aircraft? It seems that if "highly reflective" material (whatever that means)were put on top of everything, it would reflect the sun directly back up and be potentially blinding to anyone above it.

*Professor John Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, told the Guardian that only a return to pre-industrial levels of CO2 would be enough to guarantee a safe future for the planet.*

He wants the world to go back to living like they did in late 1700's/early 1800's? All of us on the Earth? And none of us could progress or try to improve our lives, just stay in that time warp? Who is going to tell the poor countries? How would we know other people were doing the same thing if we didn't have computers, or vehicles, or planes, or TV's, who would let us know we had accomplished our goal? How would we produce enough wind mills and solar panels (would they all have to be white?) for everyone on the Earth by 2015? And what would we use for energy in order to produce these products? He didn't give us the details of how to accomplish this feat, ah, the devil is always in the details..
And then when we were all done, what would we do for jobs? Or would we all just be working out in the fields growing corn and vegetables? Don't make me raise any cows. Although I wouldn't mind raising horses, not to eat of course, but to ride.

I just had a brand new roof with charcoal shingles put on due to a tree destroying the main level of the house last year during a Nor'easter. So I don't think I will be painting the shingles white, plus in the winter, it would probably make my house cooler so I would have to use more heat. I think where it is feasible and doesn't have negative consequences, go paint a roof white.

They can do whatever they want to the cities to improve them, as long as I don't have to live in one.

In the 1950s the little house I where I grew up in Dallas, Texas had a white roof (as did all the houses in the area except for one nut that had a charcoal gray roof). We had no insulation in the attic and had only evaporative coolers (in the humidity) to cool our house. (also walked 10 mi.uphill in the snow to school). The result of the roofing was we did not have oppressive heat inside most of the summer and our attic was not all that hot (just had a lot of mold growing). Now, still in Dallas area, we have R39 insulation with a reflective solar blanket to reflect out the raditive enery from the sun (also keeps in the heat in winter). Our roof is a dark gray or charcoal (as is the neighbor hood) which is insane considering our Texas summer heat and mild winters. Told my wife last week that we would get a white roof the next time we have a hale storm and listen to the neighbors talk about the nuts next door. Probably will not effect global tempertures but will help reduce the electric bill. Think I'll pass on the evaportive coolers. If we have an Ice Age, Im sure there will be another hale storm by then and I'll put on a dark gray charcoal roof.

Noticed when we do have ice on the roads, it melts faster on asphalt than it does on concrete. Might be important for all you folks up north. Most people around here dont walk on asphalt in bare feet. Momma didnt raise any fools. If you google map Albuquerque NM you can see many houses have white roofs since they have only about 8 days a year with no sun.

So it takes millions of research dollars to tell us what we already know. As Red Skelton used to say, "who would have thunk it".

In Colorado we cover our roofs (and everything else) with white for several months every year. It does a great job of cooling things down, and as a result most of us spend a couple thousand dollars a year burning fossil fuels to warm things back up to a livable temperature.

hinkle,

I lived in Albuquerque for several years and at 5,000-6,000 feet elevation, heating is more of a problem than cooling. The air conditioner might be on for eight weeks a year, but the heater is on for thirty weeks. Smart people in New Mexico build solar homes that trap as much heat as possible.

The average elevation in New Mexico is about the same as Denver.

There is a problem here that a number have acknowledged at least indirectly:

Dark solid surfaces re-radiate efficiently at the lowest temperatures. Bright surfaces reflect, but of the energy absorbed, re-radiate inefficiently at higher temperatures.

Water has an emissivity of 0.58, virtually all solids have a higher value except polished metals (mirrors).

A sod covered house, though not reflective, would probably be an optimal solution but requires copious amounts of water to extract the evaportative benefit.

I suspect this study is simplistic at best.

"He wants the world to go back to living like they did in late 1700's/early 1800's?"

No, Mary, he wants to reduce emission levels to the early 1800s. I hate to break this to you, but CO2 isn't a metric you can use to determine how well society is doing. The anti-environment, anti-science nuts tried to make this argument back in the 1960s and 1970s: that reducing pollution is the same thing as reducing living standards. Of course, we have reduced pollution -- albeit we still have a long way to go -- and our living standards haven't reverted to the stone age.

The right-wing always try to scare people into believing that improving the environment would result in taking us back to the stone age and reduce living standards. This has never happened, nor will it ever happen, but it has never stop them from their transparent political tactics. In their world, raping the environment is a necessity for capitalism. In most of our world's, we know that's not true.

Patrick Henry:

Where in CO do YOU live?! White roofs in COLORADO!?! Land of the random occurances of SNOWY WEATHER in MAY!? I live in the Denver area, and I got SNOWED IN in May THIS YEAR MAN!!!

You must live out east

paulm:

Schellhnuber, suggests large scale burning of plant material and carbon capture and storage.

Has the Guardian been hoaxed or is not coal 'plant material' from which it may be possible to capture and store the CO2?

James Caine,

Up here near the Wyoming border we cover our roofs, grass and roads with "white snow" for several months every winter. I was facetiously pointing out that high albedo is not necessarily a good thing on a cold continent like North America.

paulm,

You said:

"Another very eminent scientist urging us to wake up"

Do yourself a favour and follow the money, publicity and associates trail of these fellows, before you jump on their bandwagon. Check out the ties these scientists and government officials have with the publishing giants and Al Gore.

Check out how many companies Al has been aligned with, since the Nobel fiasco. Find out how many books and publications Al and Professor Schellnhuber have been asked to throw their two cents into. Follow the money and the recognition.

On another note, and much more pressing to your survival, if you think AGW is terrible and is all you spend your time on, start looking at the seriousness of the threats being thrown back and forth, as we speak, between the US, Russia, Syria, Venezuala, China and Iran, and what's happenning with the collapsing economy at our very doorstep, adding fuel to the global crisis.

Start wondering why Russia is bringing huge amounts of military might into Venezuala and Cuba, as we speak.

Ask yourself how much of the U.S. National treasury the Russians and Chinese actually own, outright and what powers of decision-making they hold over what we think are our corporations and government.

It's one thing to worry about a miniscule CO2 percentage theory, but it's quite another to disregard the reality that is unfolding in front of you.

I've said this before "keep an eye on the color of the horizon, as it won't be changing from global warming.

Mark,

If you think this is just the rant of another black helicopter conspiracy theorist, then, you know nothing.

Mark, Mark, Mark...

I was being facetious, did you read the entire thing I wrote?

But you do raise a good question. How do we get from here to there, i.e., pre-industrial CO2 levels? Just curious. You must have a solution. No one else seems to have one.

BTW, are you just doing your usual schtick on right-wing stuff or are you referring to me? Because as I have mentioned quite a few times to you, I use to be a registered democrat, raised by very liberal parents, but I have re-registered as an independent (democrats are too liberal for me now) and I am not religious (at all) nor do I have any children. So I don't think I qualify as a right-winger. But I do have a technical Masters degree and 2 separate B.S. degrees and the solutions proposed to stop climate change (why she asks?) so far look pretty ineffective and quite frankly, politically based.

I think the climate changelings are tilting at windmills.

Patrick Henry,

Thanks for making me chuckle. However you should have made your comment in the accent of an old New England Yankee, like this:

"Ackchoolee, we been coverin' our woofs in white 'round heeyah for yeeahs. Does seem to make things coolah. We even have a word for it, 'round these parts: Wintah."

Sometimes the best way to debate is to reduce things to absurdity.

Mark,

In order to reduce emmission levels to the 1800's and maintain today's current production and efficiency levels, the added costs to construction, manufacturing and transportation to implement the environmental standards and equipment required to achieve this, if any exist that will do the trick within reasonable costs, would have a detremental ripple effect on worldwide costs throughout all industries, forcing a reduction in wages to remain viable and thereby, lowering standards of living.

The viability factor would eventually wane as a result. The cost of doing business since implimenting environmental standards since the 70's has already drastically increased production costs and wage requirements and the price of oil in the process.

To agree to bring us to the same standards of emmissions as was in the 1800's when our production levels are 10,000 times more now than then, is totally assanine.

It's one thing to agree to something and then move forward with any measures just because they have the word "environmental" in them, but it's quite another to foresee the full ramifications of a decision before implimentation, which is rarely done nowadays. Now, go do your homework!

Patrick Henry:

Amen.

Now where's the thermostat?

Seems to me that covering these roof surfaces with solar cells would accomplish much more. This will become more practical when "paint on" solar cells or "flexible roll on" solar cell technology becomes available. Technology does provide solutions, when they are needed.