Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Solar Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/solener

Review

State of the art on the development of cool coatings for buildings

and cities
Anna Laura Pisello ⇑
CIRIAF – Interuniversity Research Centre on Pollution and Environment ‘‘Mauro Felli” at University of Perugia, Via G. Duranti 63, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Department of Engineering - University of Perugia, Via G. Duranti 91, 06125 Perugia, Italy

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Urban systems, from their early origins, were acknowledged to be responsible for both benefits and
Received 3 November 2016 penalties due to anthropogenic actions affecting human wellbeing. In this view, local overheating exac-
Received in revised form 28 January 2017 erbated by urban heat island phenomenon has been identified as a result of anthropogenic actions
Accepted 30 January 2017
responsible for citizens’ health issues and other serious socio-economic consequences in urban areas,
where almost the 70% of the world population is expected to live in thirty years. This fact imposes to
respond to an urgent research question concerning the development and the real-world application of
Keywords:
effective mitigation strategies against urban climate change phenomena, for a better population resili-
Urban heat island
Mitigation
ence. Among the variety of these strategies, the implementation of ‘‘cool” coatings over urban surfaces
Cool materials exposed to the solar radiation, i.e. cool roofs and cool pavements, represents a proved solution to coun-
Passive cooling teract such overheating effect and its negative consequences on the population living in urban context. In
Cool coatings this view, the present work reviews the state of the art about the development of new materials and their
Energy efficiency in buildings main applications as cool roofing and paving systems for passive cooling purpose of buildings and cities,
Passive cooling which have been published in more than 260 papers in the last decades. Both indoor and outdoor passive
Indoor-outdoor thermal comfort cooling benefits were clearly demonstrated and quantified with varying climate conditions, material
characteristics and the built environment context. Despite that, the investigation around this issue is still
active worldwide, from chemistry, material science and engineering fields. Additionally, new triggers
were highlighted as possible starting points for future scientific focus. In particular, still active discus-
sions give rise to promising research findings expected to clarify (i) the effect of cool coatings on pedes-
trians’ glare, possibly mitigated by directionally-reflective materials, (ii) the role of cool coatings for
HVAC optimization, (iii) the combined benefits of cool coatings and thermal-energy storage techniques
for UHI mitigation.
Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Contents

1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 661
2. Cool coatings indoor-outdoor behavior. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 662
3. The cool coating concept . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 663
3.1. Solar reflectance and infrared emittance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 663
3.2. Solar reflectance index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 664
4. Materials for cool coatings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 664
4.1. Cool roof and cool façade coatings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 664
4.2. Cool roof paintings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 664
4.3. Cool waterproof membranes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 665
4.4. Cool tiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 665
4.5. Cool natural materials. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 666
5. Multiple effects of cool coatings applications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 666

⇑ Address: CIRIAF – Interuniversity Research Centre on Pollution and Environment ‘‘Mauro Felli” at University of Perugia, Via G. Duranti 63, 06125 Perugia, Italy.
E-mail addresses: Anna.pisello@unipg.it, pisello@crbnet.it

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2017.01.068
0038-092X/Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680 661

5.1. Cool coatings for cooling energy saving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 666

5.1.1. Residential buildings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 666
5.1.2. Commercial buildings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 667
5.2. Cool coatings for urban heat island mitigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 668
5.3. Cool coatings for indoor thermal comfort optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 669
5.4. Cool coatings for outdoor thermal comfort optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 669
5.5. Cool coatings for optimizing HVAC and PV performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 670
5.6. Cool coatings durability and life-cycle performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 671
5.7. Cost-benefit analysis of cool coatings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 672
6. Statistics on cool coatings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 672
7. Concluding remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 674
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 675
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 676

1. Introduction
From their early origins, urban systems have produced both
benefits of penalties due to anthropogenic actions (Pain, 2016).
Some risks have been successfully tackled while other new ones
are increasingly making urban citizens more vulnerable. Anthro-
pogenic heat release represents an added energy input to the
energy balance (Zhao et al., 2014; Ward et al., 2013) in cities,
responsible for the urban surface temperature increase, i.e. the
world-wide known phenomenon of Urban Heat Island (UHI)
Allen et al., 2011; Fischer and Schär, 2010.
Lindberg et al. (2013) estimated the quantitative consequences
of the anthropogenic heat excess in cities through the global
anthropogenic heat flux (QF) model LUCY (Large scale Urban Con-
sumption of energY model), allowing them to identify a general
relatively low QF around European territory (i.e. about 1.9–
4.6 W m
2), but with urban maximum peaks up to around
80 W m
2 simulated in London dense boroughs. Such excess of
anthropogenic heat showed to be responsible for massive increase
of energy need for cooling in summer, up to 13%, and on the other
side, the decrease in energy consumption for heating in winter cor-
responded to around 11%. Such urban energy balance variation and
extra-carbon emissions in densely populated areas are identified as
key consequences of the urban heat island (UHI) phenomenon. UHI
has been widely acknowledged as a direct responsible for citizens’
health issues (Patz et al., 2005; Li et al., 2013) and other serious
socio-economic and energy consequences in urban areas (Harlan
et al., 2006; Santamouris, 2016; Wang and He, 2014), where almost
85% of the world population is expected to live in 2100 (World
Urbanization Prospects, 2014) and where almost 80% of the total
CO2eq emissions are produced (Pérez-Lombard et al., 2008). The
acknowledged consequences of dense and rapid urbanization, with
the following decrease of natural landscape, basically concerns the
massive modification of the local energy balance due to the imple-
mentation of radiative absorbent and non-permeable surfaces that
tend to minimize their capability to reflect heat much more than
forests and planted areas and, therefore, being responsible for the
dramatic increase of urban surface and air temperature
(Santamouris and Kolokotsa, 2015). In this view, Urban heat island
(UHI) is the most acknowledged climate change related phe-
nomenon, which has been documented through a wide variety of
experimental and simulation studies (Neophytou et al., 2014;
Kusaka and Kimura, 2004; Richiardone and Brusasca, 1989) aimed
at investigating overheating path of urban temperatures with
respect to the relatively colder conditions of suburban areas
(Chen et al., 2016; F. Chen et al., 2014; C. Chen et al., 2014). Such
phenomenon has been also acknowledged for being responsible
for serious socio-economic and health issues making city citizens
more vulnerable to climate change and less resilient to its conse-
quences (Santamouris and Kolokotsa, 2015; Pyrgou et al., 2017;
Heaviside et al., 2016). The situation becomes even more urgent
knowing about the rapid gathering of population in urban areas,
and the consequent need for cheap and readily available dwellings,
where indoor environmental low quality and energy poverty
showed to hugely compromise occupants’ health conditions and
comfort during extreme climate events (Hatvani-Kovacs et al.,
2016a, 2016b, 2016c), e.g. heat waves (Graham et al., 2016;
Ward et al., 2016).
In this perspective, a massive scientific effort has been dedi-
cated to the proposal of geo-engineering based solutions for effec-
tively mitigating climate change phenomena, such as UHI (Akbari
et al., 2016; Akbari and Muscio, 2015). Among these solutions,
the proposal of high albedo materials for urban paving and build-
ing envelopes has been proving key achievements during the last
decades, as effective measure for counteracting urban warming
by increasing the solar reflectance of urban surfaces and, therefore,
urban solar heat gain (Wang and Akbari, 2015). High albedo sur-
faces are typically characterized by ‘‘cool” coatings applied over
building roofs and outdoor pavements, considering the large
potentiality of such surfaces to contribute to UHI mitigation. In
fact, roof surfaces in urban areas may correspond to about 20–
40% of the total area exposed to solar radiation, while the paved
area correspond to 29–44% of the total (Akbari and Matthews,
2012; Xu et al., 2012b), meaning that the implementation of cool
coatings could be massively handled with promising local and glo-
bal benefits energy and environmental benefits.
The key benefits of cool coatings when applied over building
envelopes and urban pavements basically consist of the improve-
ment of indoor and outdoor thermal comfort conditions in summer
with evident contribution at several scales: such as the indoor-
outdoor microclimate scale and the mesoclimate scale, together
with the global climate one (Cotana et al., 2014b; Rossi et al.,
2013; Akbari et al., 2012, 2009b). At the same time, if the cool coat-
ing is also applied over building roofs and facades, it can lower the
energy need and the CO2 eq emissions for cooling imputable to the
HVAC operation or, as passive cooling technique, it can improve
indoor thermal comfort conditions in summer (Pisello et al.,
2016c; Wang et al., 2016). Therefore, cool coatings can be effective
measurements for counteracting the increasing trends of (i) cool-
ing energy in urban areas, (ii) air pollution and ozone concentra-
tion in cities (Sheng et al., 2017), and (iii) urban carbon footprint
(Rossi et al., 2016a).
Despite the consistent agreement about the effect of high
albedo solutions for indoor-outdoor overheating mitigation, the
effectiveness of cool coatings is sensitive to both UHI characteris-
tics and building features where they are applied. In particular,
UHI represents a complex phenomenon, depending on a variety
of factors such as: local weather boundary, geomorphology, urban
layout, anthropogenic heat intensity, urban vegetation design,
characteristics of building skins and, more in general, of the whole
662 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
Fig. 1. The review paper concept and layout.
urban built environment surfaces (Santamouris and Kolokotsa,
2015). In this view, recent literature contributions showed that
cooling need reduction due to cool roofs corresponds to 2–44%,
with an average benefit around 20%(Kolokotsa et al., 2012;
Synnefa et al., 2006a). The same high albedo surfaces demon-
strated to mitigate outdoor local overheating by about 0.2 K for
each 10% increase of albedo (Santamouris et al., 2012b).
In this panorama, this paper is aimed at reviewing the state of
the art concerning the development and testing of cool coatings
as energy efficiency and local climate change mitigation strategy,
when applied to building envelope and, more in general, to the
urban built environment (Fig. 1). Therefore, starting from the anal-
ysis of the wide literature background and other reviews in this
field (Santamouris et al., 2011), this review deals with the key
updates about the new generation of materials and products for
cool coatings, their applications as high-albedo urban skins, the
final discussions around this matter, basically concerning the cur-
rent still open issues and futures trends in this field, e.g. life cycle
assessment implications, cost-benefit analysis, durability and age-
ing protocols. Finally, a brief statistical analysis about research
products published within this framework has been carried out,
showing the massive progress achieved in this scientific field dur-
ing the course of last five decades.
2. Cool coatings indoor-outdoor behavior
As previously mentioned, cool coatings applied over building
roofs provide a very effective solution for passive cooling of build-
ing indoors and of local outdoor microclimate, when applied over
urban pavements. The first generation of cool coatings (Berdahl
and Bretz, 1997a) basically consisted of natural materials, intrinsi-
cally characterized by high albedo (Doulos et al., 2004; Bretz and
Akbari, 1997; Reagan and Acklam, 1979), which is also something
recently re-gaining the scientific attention, such as natural stones
aggregates having light color and taking also advantage of their
permeability, being porous layers for roofs and walkable surfaces
(Pisello et al., 2014b; Shokri Kuehni et al., 2016). They typically
present relatively higher albedo compared to standard bitumen
layers, e.g. around 0.5–0.7, but not as much as the following gener-
ation of artificial cool coatings. Such following trend basically con-
sisted on the development, in-lab measurement and optimization,
and field testing of very white coatings, i.e. with albedo higher than
0.8 (Rosenfeld et al., 1995b; Costanzo et al., 2013). In these two
phases, the key experimental investigations prepared the ground
for the following generation of cool coatings, consisting of non-
white high-albedo materials also suitable for application in histor-
ical contexts or environmentally preserved environments, where
the massive application of light color techniques would have mas-
sively modified the outdoor visual perception of the built environ-
ment (Ferrari et al., in press, 2016a; Levinson et al., 2010a, 2005a).
Those materials were characterized by high reflectance within the
non-visible region of the solar spectrum, i.e. the near infrared one,
where around half of the solar energy is released (Ferrari et al.,
2015a). Such cool colored coatings were characterized by a much
higher albedo that conventional colors, with a consequent reduc-
tion of their surface temperature when exposed to outdoor solar
radiation. Synnefa et al. (2007e, 2006a) wrote two reference stud-
ies in this field by reporting the test procedures in terms of optic-
thermal performance of 10 cool colored coatings, elaborated by
using high-NIR reflecting pigments achieving the same color of
classic ‘‘hot” pigments. Firstly, solar spectrophotometer measure-
ments were carried out in order to identify the SRI optimization,
achieving the best performance in the black coating samples
where, starting from a SR of 5% the ‘‘cool black” was characterized
by a SR of 27%. Then, also thermal emittance tests were performed
and they showed negligible differences imputable to the cool pig-
ment inclusion. Finally, superficial temperature has been continu-
ously monitored during the course of 5 months of field experiment,
and an acceptable linear correlation was identified in between
solar reflectance increase and daily peak surface temperature
decrease. Then, the following conceptual step was pursued by ana-
lyzing the effect of the developed cool coatings on the energy need
or residential buildings, which was achieved in 2006 (Synnefa
et al., 2007f). In this work, the authors performed a variety of build-
ing thermos-energy dynamic simulation in residential cases with
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
varying climate conditions and roof solar reflectance, and therefore
they found out that cool coatings applied over roofs were able to
produce 18–93% decrease in cooling load and 11–27% decrease in
terms of peak cooling demand in air-conditioned buildings. At
the same time, they also started talking about possible winter
penalties, and they identified sort of balanced relation between
summer benefits and winter penalties with varying climate condi-
tions. The analysis of such winter penalties was more deeply car-
ried out only several Years later in London, in Canada, in Italy
and in the Netherlands (Pisello and Cotana, 2014c; Hosseini and
Akbari, 2014; Kolokotroni et al., 2013; Mastrapostoli et al., 2014),
where both experimental and numerical studies showed that, in
winter conditions or in cold climate areas, the solar forcing is rel-
atively minor given the low sun angle, the short daily sunny time,
and the relatively more frequent cloudy sky conditions.
Outdoor benefits produced by cool coating applications concern
several scale analyses, starting from the benefits of outdoor paving
for pedestrians located in close proximity to the cool coating, up to
the urban scale and finally to the regional (Savio et al., 2006) and
planetary scale, which does not represent the focus of this review
but it still deserves to be considered when dealing with cool coat-
ing holistic performance analysis. City scale investigations are
mainly focused on urban heat island mitigation potential of cool
surfaces, such as cool roofs, like it has been studied in Athens
(Synnefa et al., 2008b), New York, and many other cities
(Mangiarotti et al., 2008; Santamouris, 2015), after demonstrating
that more than 400 major cities in the world suffer from increased
urban temperatures (Santamouris, 2015). A massive impulse to
these studies was originally given by forward-looking policy cam-
paigns, like the ones implemented in the United States more than
20 years ago (Rosenfeld et al., 1995b), where highly promising pro-
grams supported by energy utilities and product labeling initia-
tives started pushing the market, together with the scientific
international flow toward high albedo materials application over
buildings and streets for urban heat island mitigation. For instance,
Levinson et al. (2005b) quantified both energy saving and eco-
nomic benefits associated to the cool roof implementation in non-
residential buildings in California, highlighting how they are able
to decrease cooling electricity use, peak cooling power demand,
and cooling-equipment capacity need, while increasing heating
energy consumption, with respect to non-cool low-sloped roofs.
Their quantitative analysis carried out by means of DOE-2.1E
building energy simulation tool prepared the ground for the next
implementation of cool-roof technology within the California
Title-24 NR building energy efficiency standard for all the building
types. The following key progress achieved in US energy policies
was reviewed by Levinson and Akbari (2008) in 2008.
3. The cool coating concept
A cool coating is a highly reflective covering material that, when
applied over a surface exposed to solar radiation, can absorb less
heat and stay cooler, compared to a more traditional coating. In
this way, it reduces the amount of energy absorbed by a surface
where it is applied by means of a selective absorption and reflec-
tion of spectral wavelength. This has benefits both at single-
building scale and at inter-building scale up to the mesoscale
and global climate level, as previously mentioned (Pisello et al.,
2016d). In fact, at building scale the application of cool coatings
over building skin allows to (i) reduce building cooling loads, (ii)
improve indoor thermal comfort, (iii) increase the lifetime of the
building roof structure which is less affected by thermal stresses,
and (iv) decrease the CO2 emissions in the atmosphere due to
the buildings’ HVAC operation especially during summer. At the
same time, at city level, cool coatings help mitigating urban heat
663
island effect by reflecting most of the incident solar energy back,
and therefore, they minimize the heat absorbed and released by
irradiated built environment surfaces (Rossi et al., 2016b).
High solar reflectance and high thermal emittance, or cool, coat-
ings therefore represent a cost effective, environmentally sustain-
able and passive solution able to significantly contribute to
indoor and outdoor overheating reduction and, at the same time,
to the reduction of waste by increasing the lifetime of the roof sur-
faces where they are applied (Antonaia et al., 2016; Ihara et al.,
2016). Furthermore, they can be easily applied in a variety of urban
surfaces such as building roofs, paved streets and squares, where
they also improve outdoor comfort conditions for pedestrians,
which thermal wellbeing is much affected by surface temperature,
in severe climate conditions in particular (Santamouris and
Kolokotsa, 2015).
3.1. Solar reflectance and infrared emittance
As general definition of a cool coating, it is a material which is
characterized by combined high solar reflectance (SR) and high
infrared emittance (TE) Gentle et al., 2011, where SR is the capabil-
ity of a textured surface to reflect solar radiation over the hemi-
sphere and the solar spectrum, including the direct and the
diffuse component. Having also high infrared emittance, a cool
coating is able to re-radiate previously absorbed heat compared
to a black body working at the same temperature. Both of these
properties are usually measured on a scale of 0–1 or 0–100%.
Therefore, when a cool coating is applied over a building envelope
or an urban paving, it is able to reflect solar radiation and emit heat
and therefore, to reduce its superficial temperature under the sun,
resulting in less heat entering the building and less air overheating
in close proximity to the urban paving.
The standard methods to evaluate solar reflectance of a surface
are the ASTM E903-2012, which reports the calculation procedure
starting from in-lab experimental data achieved through spec-
trophotometer with integrating sphere (ASTM E903-12, 2012).
Standard ASTM C1549-02 describes the procedure to measure SR
by portable solar reflectometer though in-situ method (ASTM
C1549, 2002). Also, ASTM ASTM E1918-06 ASTM E1918-06
(2015) describes the test method for measuring SR on horizontal
or low-slope large surfaces by means of pyranometers in the field,
which is applicable when the sun angle to the normal from a sur-
face is less than 45 degrees. While the reference standard ASTM
G173-03-08 (ASTM G173-03, 2008) provide the direct normal
and hemispherical reference solar spectral irradiance values with
varying coated surface tilt angle, air mass, etc. The standard
method to measure thermal emissivity by portable emissometer
is the ASTM C1371-2015 (ASTM C1371-15).
The best performing cool coatings usually present SR around
80% or more, compared to standard black coatings (e.g. bitumen
based ones, etc.) which reflect less than 10% of solar radiation,
and they are characterized by thermal emittance values around
0.80–0.90. Both these key properties are sensitive to the most exte-
rior layer of the surface exposed to the solar radiation, that is the
reason why they are referred to as ‘‘coatings” for surface applica-
tions. Therefore, they hugely affect the thermal balance of a hori-
zontal surface, i.e. roof or urban paving, exposed to the solar
radiation, described as follows in steady state conditions (1):
  dT
ð1
SRÞI ¼ TEr T 4s
T 4sky þ hc ðT s
T a Þ
k ð1Þ
dx
where
SR is the solar reflectance or albedo of the irradiated surface,
ranging from 0 to 1.
I is the solar irradiance [W/m2].
664 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
TE is thermal emittance ranging from 0 to 1.
r is Stefan-Boltzmann constant (5.6685  10
8 [W/m2 K4]).
Ts is the surface temperature of the given surface [K].
Tsky is sky conventional temperature [K].
hc is the convection coefficient [W/m2 K].
Ta is the air temperature [K].
k is thermal conductivity of the same surface [W/mK].
dT
dx
is temperature gradient in the surface layer, describing tem-
perature change in the considered direction x.
The previous balance (1) shows that, if the cool coating is
applied over a thermally insulated roof exposed to solar radiation,
its thermal behavior is mainly affected by SR and TE, being the k
component relatively less important. More in details, during daily
hours, when the sun forcing represent the key boundary affecting
the surface temperature of the coating, SR is the main parameter
that, if optimized, can reduce the surface temperature Ts. During
nocturnal hours, on the other hand, the night-time performance
is much affected by infrared emittance, affecting the surface capa-
bility to re-radiate heat toward the sky.
3.2. Solar reflectance index
Since cool coatings are exhaustively characterized by consider-
ing of both solar reflectance and infrared emittance, a calculated
parameter named SRI (Solar Reflectance Index) was proposed for
incorporating SE and TE into one unique value. A dedicated inter-
national standard was developed in order to report the ‘‘Standard
Practice for Calculating Solar Reflectance Index of Horizontal and
Low-Sloped Opaque Surfaces” (ASTM E1980-11, 2011). In particu-
lar, SRI describes the passive cooling potentiality of a flat surface
compared to a standard black (with SR of 5% and TE of 90%), having
a SRI of zero, and a standard white (with SR of 80% and TE of 90%),
having a SRI of 100. It is calculated as follows (2):

2007a) showed that surfaces with low solar reflectance and high
T black
T surface
SRI ¼  100 ð2Þ
ðT black
T white Þ
where Tblack, Twhite and Tsurface represents the surface temperatures
of the standard black, white, and the tested material surface,
respectively, in steady-state conditions.
Therefore, high performance cool coatings could have an SRI
higher than 100, while dark and absorbent materials have SRI
lower or close to zero.
Given the complexity of further variables affecting both indoor
and outdoor overheating mitigation potential of cool coatings, SRI
calculation does not represent an exhaustive parameter for com-
pletely determining the cool coating performance, since, as previ-
ously studied within a variety of experimental and numerical
works, it is much affected by climatological parameters, such as
spectral characteristics of the solar radiation, ambient temperature
and relative humidity, wind speed and all the other parameters
mainly affecting weatherization of cool coatings, e.g. precipitation,
pollution, etc. (Levinson et al., 2005c; Levinson and Akbari, 2010).
Within this framework, the following section will deal with the
analysis of the most promising cool coating materials (Section 3),
by presenting the key achievements in this field at both building
and city level (Section 4).
4. Materials for cool coatings
4.1. Cool roof and cool façade coatings
Most of the available cool roof products and technologies are
developed for flat roof application, but many solutions are recently
being implemented also in tilted roof surfaces. They are typically
membranes, coatings, paintings, metal roofs, shingles, and tiles.
Generally, cool or reflective roofs are single ply or liquid applied.
Typical liquid products include white paints, elastomeric, polyur-
ethane or acrylic coatings, i.e. EPDM (Ethylene-Propylenediene-Te
trolymer Membrane), PVC (Polyvinyl Chloride), CPE (Chlorinated
Polyethylene), CPSE (Chlorosulfonated Polyethylene), and TPO
(Thermoplastic Polyolefin) materials (Santamouris and Synnefa,
2011).
Generally, a smooth black asphalt roof with an initial reflec-
tance of 0.04 can reach a 0.80 if coated with a smooth white sur-
face (Levinson et al., 2005a; Berdahl and Bretz, 1997b).
Additionally, a black single-ply membrane with initial reflectance
of 0.04 can reach 0.20 and 0.80 solar reflectance is if gray and
white, respectively. Finally, a bitumen membrane with a reflec-
tance of 0.1–0.2 can achieve solar reflectance value of 0.65–0.7 if
a white coating is applied on top. On the other hand, cool white
coatings, which are typically elastomeric or cementitious, have
solar reflectance values ranging from 0.7 to 0.85. Silver aluminum
coatings contain aluminum flakes in an asphalt-type resin able to
increase the solar reflectance to >0.5 for the most reflective coat-
ings (Akbari et al., 1998; https://www.energystar.gov/).
A full list of cool roof materials meeting certain criteria is pro-
vided by Energy Star Roof Products (http://coolroofs.org/):
- low-slope roofs: initial solar reflectance > 0.65 and aged
reflectance > 0.50;
- steep-slope roofs: initial solar reflectance > 0.25 and aged solar
reflectance > 0.15.
Databases with information about the solar reflectance and the
infrared emittance of commercial roof products are also provided
by the US Cool Roof Rating Council and the EU Project Cool Roofs
(http://coolroofcouncil.eu/; Zhang et al., 2007).
Experimental studies (Akbari and Taha, 1992; Levinson et al.,
infrared emittance (e.g. black coating, asphalt shingle, black gravel
surface) reach temperatures up to 75–80 °C, surfaces with medium
to high solar reflectance and low infrared emittance (e.g. unpainted
metal roofs, aluminum coatings) reach temperatures up to 60–
75 °C and surfaces with high solar reflectance and infrared emit-
tance (cool white coatings, white membranes, etc.) reach average
temperatures of 45 °C, depending on local conditions.
4.2. Cool roof paintings
One of the most effective cool roof solution is represented by
paintings and coatings. In fact, cool coatings are documented to
have a superior thermal performance even compared to other cool
materials like white marble and white mosaic. Statistical analyses
showed differences in the thermal behavior even among coatings
of the same type and color, mainly due to the differences in (i) their
reflectance, affecting their performance during the day, and (ii)
their emissivity, influencing the thermal performance during the
night in mid-latitude summer conditions (Synnefa et al., 2006b).
The solar reflectance of white coatings is essentially due to the
presence of transparent polymers and white pigments. The most
commonly used pigments are represented by the zinc dioxide,
the titanium dioxide (mostly in the form of rutile), presenting a
solar reflectance between 0.70 and 0.85.
The use of selective cool ‘‘paints” allows to enhance the
thermal-optical properties of materials’ surfaces by modifying
their interactions with incident solar radiation. In fact, white and
cool selective paints in general can significantly improve the hemi-
spherical solar reflectivity value of a material. The absorption of
cool selective painted surfaces is almost never higher than 0.20
compared to the 0.93–0.96 of black surfaces.
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
Many research studies investigated the passive cooling poten-
tial of such products. For instance, 14 different reflective paintings
were monitored by (Synnefa et al., 2007c) in terms of surface tem-
perature, spectral reflectance, and infrared emittance. A reduction
by 4 °C and 2 °C was registered in summer conditions during the
day and the night, respectively, by demonstrating the major
thermal-performance of such cool solutions compared to more tra-
ditional non-cool ones.
Additionally, near-infrared reflective colored pigments able to
maintain lower surface temperatures than conventionally pig-
mented color-matched coatings were developed in (Uemoto
et al., 2010). This temperature difference is indeed mainly due to
differences in solar reflectance. These cool colored coatings can
be used on buildings (roofs and walls) and other surfaces in the
urban environment. Thus, at building scale, the use of cool colored
coatings can improve building comfort and reduce cooling energy
use, while at city city-scale it can contribute to the reduction of
outdoor air temperature due to the heat-transfer phenomena and
therefore improve outdoor thermal comfort by reducing the
heat-island effect.
The thermal performance of cool colored acrylic paints contain-
ing infrared reflective pigments in comparison to conventional col-
ored acrylic paints of similar colors (i.e. white, brown, and yellow)
applied on sheets of corrugated fiber cement roofing was also
investigated according to ASTM D 2244-2016 ASTM D2244-16,
2016), the UV/VIS/NIR, and ASTM E 903-2012. Results demon-
strated that the cool colored paint formulations produced signifi-
cantly higher NIR reflectance than conventional paints of similar
colors, and that the surface temperatures were more than 10 °C
lower than those of conventional paints when exposed to infrared
radiation. Moreover, in Xue et al. (2015) the optical properties and
the cooling effect of a bi-functional cool white roof coating based
on styrene acrylate copolymer and cement integrating both a good
cooling effect and good mechanical properties and impermeability
was studied. Such cool white coating has a much higher solar
reflectance compared with the conventional polymer-modified
cement-based waterproof coatings due to the presence of the tita-
nium dioxide rutile and Altiris 800, and can significantly reduce
surface temperatures.
Therefore, a significant thermal benefit can be achieved by
replacing dark colored materials with materials of the same color
including near infrared reflecting pigments. Synnefa et al.
(2007d)measured the temperature differences between 10 proto-
type cool colored coatings/paints by using near infrared reflective
complex inorganic color pigments and an acryl based binder and
10 traditionally non-cool pigmented coatings of the same color.
The maximum temperature difference observed was 10.2 °C in
summer between the cool and the standard black, associated to a
solar reflectance difference of 0.22 (i.e. between 0.05 and 0.27 of
the standard and cool black, respectively). In winter the tempera-
ture difference between cool and standard colored coatings was
found to be less than 1 °C.
4.3. Cool waterproof membranes
Cool roofing membranes are also a very diffuse way to increase
roof solar reflectance and therefore passive cooling potential. It
was proved that innovative cool membranes can optimize building
year-round energy efficiency by up to 19.3% (Pisello et al., 2016e).
An innovative waterproof polyurethane-based membrane was
experimentally tested both in laboratory and in-field before and
after optimization by means of titanium-dioxide and ceramic
microsphere (Revel et al., 2014a). Solar reflectance values between
80.7% and 85.4% were detected compared to the more traditional
and darker membrane, i.e. 26%. In other studies (Revel et al.,
2014b; Ramamurthy et al., 2015) an innovative white membrane
665
based on a mix of metal oxide pigments i.e. CoAl, FeCr, and NiSbTi
characterized by an increased NIR solar reflectance of +0.40 com-
pared to dark traditional membranes was developed. Such formula
was able to improve the global SRI by 26 points without affecting
the thermal emittance.
Despite their good thermal-energy performance given their
capability to reduce peak surface temperatures, cooling energy
need, and offset CO2, highly reflective roofing membranes suffer
from weathering, soiling, and biological growth that might affect
their solar reflectance. The solar spectral reflectance values of 12
different roofing membranes was measured in Paolini et al.
(2014) before the exposure and after 3, 6, 12, 18, and 24 months
of natural ageing in different Italian cities. Results showed a
decrease of solar reflectance with time by 0.14 in Roma and 0.22
in Milano after two years. A new and aged cool roofing membrane
was assessed also in Turkey (Kültür and Türkeri, 2012) by means of
lab and field experimental campaign, confirming a slight reduction
of solar reflectance capability mainly due to weathering effects.
Most recent research efforts in the field of cool roofing mem-
branes are focused on the combination of cool materials and ther-
mal storage effect as passive technique for building thermal-
energy efficiency and urban heat island mitigation. For instance,
an innovative cool polyurethane based membrane with integrated
phase change materials (PCMs) was proposed (Pisello et al., 2016a)
for combining the thermal benefits of high-albedo with improved
latent heat storage capability in the view of surface peak tempera-
ture buffering and durability improvement due to minor thermal
stress within the polymer-based membrane (Pisello et al., 2017).
The promising results produced highlighted also the relatively sim-
ple production process of PCMs inclusion into cool coatings. Con-
sistently with previous works, Lu et al. (2016a) investigated the
effect of encapsulated PCMs into cool coatings when applied over
building envelopes and they showed promising effects in terms
of peak temperature reduction and potential energy efficiency
improvement due to the lower heat flow through the envelope.
At the same time, given the thermal buffer effect of thermal-
energy storage systems such as phase change materials, their effect
when applied as urban heat island mitigation technique is contro-
versial, since their delayed heat release may lead to larger air tem-
perature rise, if during nighttime.
4.4. Cool tiles
Among the main solar reflective roofing materials, ‘‘cool” tiles
can be listed as one of the most original technique, suitable for
integration in existing and historical buildings given its low aes-
thetic and architectural impact. In fact, traditional tilted roofs are
generally characterized by ceramic tiles of traditional colors such
as brick red with generally low solar reflectance that can cause
overheating of the building due to solar gains during summer. Even
if polymeric products dominate nowadays the cool roof market,
the use of cool ceramic-based tiles can guarantee a very good cool
roofing performance by combining great architectural quality and
thermal-energy purposes i.e. good optical properties and durability
(Ferrari et al., 2015b). Ceramic products in fact are naturally char-
acterized by a high thermal emissivity and chemical-physical dura-
bility. In Ferrari et al. (2016b) a traditionally engobed porcelain tile
was used as a substrate for a new generation of colored glazes
characterized by different surfaces reaching promising values in
solar reflectance. Cool-colored tile with relatively high solar reflec-
tance, combined with a thin insulating layer and made of a silica-
gel super-insulating material with an aluminum foil with very low
thermal emittance applied below the insulating layer were also
developed in Pisello (2015). Such composite tiles can provide a
strong increase of roof thermal resistance, helpful to control either
heat loss in winter and building overheating in summer. They can
666 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
be installed on an existing roof, for instance the sloped tile roof of a
historical or traditional building, with no need to modify the roof
height and structure.
In this same scenario, the optimization of the traditional clay
tiles with the purpose of building energy retrofit according to the
constraint to preserve architectural heritage was performed by
Pisello et al. (2016b) and Miller (2005). Therefore, innovative cool
clay tiles with 0.75 of solar reflectance but with the same appear-
ance of traditional historical tiles were implemented. Such tiles are
able to guarantee a maximum primary energy saving for cooling of
51% with a heating energy penalty lower than 2%. Therefore, these
tiles represent an effective non-invasive strategy to (i) optimize
thermal-energy performance of historic buildings even in temper-
ate climate, and (ii) mitigate urban climate. In fact, the heat pene-
tration can be reduced up to 70% by substituting a concrete tile
with a cool tile (Miller and Kriner, 2001).
Moreover, it was demonstrated that a 14 °C surface tempera-
ture difference can be reached with a cool steep-slope roof com-
pared to a conventional dark roof (Mangiarotti et al., 2008). Six
cool colored tiles with a solar reflectance difference between 0.15
and 0.41 with respect to the same traditional tiles were developed
and tested in 1:10-scale model houses in California with insulation
(R = 1.9 m2 K/W). Surface temperatures reduced by 5–14 °C and a
heat flux reduction of 13–21% were detected (Levinson et al.,
2007b, 2010b).
Different techniques to increase solar reflectance of concrete
tiles are available. A novel strategy based on a two-layer spray
coating process where both layers are pigmented latex paint based
on acrylic or PVDF/acrylic technology was developed by Levinson
et al. (2007a). Such innovative method was applied by using as
first layer a TiO2 rutile white and as second layer cool color top-
coat with weak NIR absorption and/or strong NIR backscattering
instead of using more traditional thick white acrylic basecoats
and cool color acrylic topcoats. A significant increase of the initial
solar reflectance was found, ranging from 0.26 (dark brown) to
0.57 (light green) for the cool colored tiles ranged and from 0.18
(dark brown) to 0.34 (light green) for the cool colored shingles.
Methods based on one-coat (substrate/topcoat) and two-coat
(substrate/ basecoat/topcoat) systems depending on the near
infrared reflectance of the substrate were also proposed (Synnefa
et al., 2006a; Levinson et al., 2014). For metal and clay tile prod-
ucts that have originally high near infrared reflectance, a topcoat
containing near infrared reflecting pigments was used. For gray-
cement concrete tile or gray aggregate with low near infrared
reflectance, a cool topcoat or basecoat with high near infrared
backscattering was applied. By means of the one-coat (cool top-
coat) process to metal and glazed clay-tile roofing products, near
infrared reflectance values of 0.50 and 0.75, respectively, were
achieved. The application of a thick coating colored by rutile white
near infrared scattering pigments on gray-cement concrete tiles
lead to near infrared reflectance values of 0.60. A two-coat process
(TiO2 rutile white basecoat plus topcoat colored by near infrared -
transparent organic pigments) resulted in a near infrared reflec-
tance of 0.85.
The optical properties and the thermal performance of 14 types
of reflective coatings (white and aluminum ones) have been mea-
sured by Synnefa et al. (2006a). It was found that a cool coating can
reduce a white concrete tile’s surface temperature by 4 °C and by
2 °C in day and nighttime, respectively, during summer. Therefore,
given the large application potentiality of cool clay and cement-
based tiles, they represent a key cool roof solution for mitigating
urban heat island in historical cities or traditional architecture
built environment, even if their specific solar reflectance capability
is relatively lower than high-performance cool coatings previously
dealt with, which can be implemented in a relatively minor range
of building typologies and urban contexts.
4.5. Cool natural materials
Another kind of cool roof materials is represented by natural
materials, which can generate important benefits to the buildings’
thermal-energy performance given their intrinsic optimal thermal-
optical properties, both at single-building scale and urban scale.
The use of naturally cool materials allows indeed to combine
intrinsic cool properties with low-cost and low-embodied energy
to achieve a satisfying thermal performance with reduced environ-
mental impact.
Gravels (Levinson et al., 2014) are detected to be one of the
most commonly used ‘‘natural” cool roof materials for horizontal
application, especially in the Mediterranean area, as they can be
simply applied over the existing bitumen membranes generally
installed on the existing roofs. Such material is very sustainable
from both an environmental and economic perspective, especially
if locally available and due to the naturally light-colored stones.
The passive cooling potential of different types of gravels charac-
terized by different grain size was assessed in Pisello et al.
(2014a). It was found out that the albedo increases with decreasing
grain size.
In this same scenario, also light-colored marble has been desig-
nated as a cool natural material due to its intrinsic optimal cool
characteristics (Rosso et al., 2014). Results from experimental test-
ing of the cooling potential of such material show solar reflectance
values up to 79%, while dynamic simulations allow to detect up to
18% of summer cooling energy saving compared to a traditional
non-cool concrete envelope.
5. Multiple effects of cool coatings applications
5.1. Cool coatings for cooling energy saving
The application of cool roofs application in new and existing
buildings can significantly improve the energy efficiency during
the cooling season and throughout the year. Several research stud-
ies focused on the quantification of the energy saving achievable
my means of cool roof application in both residential and non-
residential buildings (Akbari and Konopacki, 2004). Such energy
savings are reported to be between 2% and 44%, with an average
of 20%. Such percentages vary depending on the specific boundary
conditions in terms of local climate phenomena, building envelope
characteristics, sky view factor, building type and use, HVAC sys-
tems, etc.
Many different approaches can be used to quantify the actual
energy saving directly attributable to the application of a cool roof,
i.e. experimental assessment by means of in-field monitoring and
numerical analysis. The experimental monitoring can be per-
formed by means of dedicated microclimate indoor-outdoor sta-
tions, while the numerical analysis can be carried out by means
of calibrated dynamic simulation that allows to accurately predict
the annual energy saving due to the use of a cool roof system with
varying weather conditions and climate scenarios, in both com-
mercial and residential constructions. For instance, the cooling
energy savings due to the application of cool materials for 240
regions in the United States was calculated to be between 12%
and 25% for residential buildings between 5% and 18% for office
buildings, and between 7% and 17% for commercial buildings
(Miller et al., 2002).
5.1.1. Residential buildings
The most common cool roof solutions consist of high albedo and
high-emittance coatings or membranes applied over commercial
buildings situated in mild or hot climate areas. Nevertheless, the
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
application of cool roof solutions over residential buildings is
nowadays becoming more frequent.
In fact, significant energy savings can be achieved by applying a
cool roof over a residential building, with the intensity varying
depending on the specific building characteristics and use, local
ambient conditions, type of installed HVAC systems, etc. In fact,
cool roofs represent a relatively inexpensive technique to reduce
the summer building energy requirements for cooling, and they
can usually be easily applied over existing roof also in the context
of refurbishment or maintenance processes, by respecting the
architectural and aesthetic constraints of the building. Energy sav-
ings are usually detected to be more important in ancient houses
with little or no roof insulation.
Up to 15% cooling energy saving were detected by applying a
cool brown coating on traditional brown tiles with a solar reflec-
tance of 0.3 (Pisello and Cotana, 2014a). Additionally, an innovative
cool clay tile was developed in tested in (Rosado et al., 2014) on a
traditional residential building in central Italy to improve the ther-
mal conditions of the indoor environment that is adjacent to the
roof. The year-round experimental observations revealed a maxi-
mum decrease if the summer peak indoor overheating of the attic
by 4.7 °C. The corresponding winter maximum overcooling reduc-
tion was found to be 1.2 °C. Such innovative cool roof solution was
therefore identified as suitable for implementation on traditional
sloped roofs with a clay tile covering, producing non-negligible
thermal benefits in summer and relatively small penalties in win-
ter, even in temperate climates.
In the same scenario, a continuous monitoring of two similar
single-family, single-story homes built side by side in Fresno (Cal-
ifornia) was carried out for a year in order to assess cool-roof ben-
efits in terms of temperatures, heat flows, and energy uses of a cool
roof (albedo 0.51) compared to a traditional roof (albedo 0.15)
Dabaieha et al., 2015. The annual cooling energy saving directly
attributable to the cool roof application were detected to be equal
to 2.82 kW h/m2 (i.e.26%), and the peak-hour cooling power
demand reduction was 0.88 W/m2 (i.e.37%). Moreover, a conse-
quent reduction of 15%, 10%, and 22% CO2, NOx, and SO2 emission
due to the annual conditioning were measured.
Other works (Dias et al., 2014) analyzed the cool roof passive
cooling capability in very hot and dry climates, where almost half
the urban peak load of energy consumption is used to satisfy air-
conditioning cooling needs in summer. A hybrid algorithmic was
designed to simulate 37 roof design probabilities in terms of roof
shape, material and construction. The results of using a roof with
high albedo coating show a fall of 53% in discomfort hours and a
summer energy saving of 826 kW h compared to the conventional
non-insulated and non-cool flat roof in typical Cairo residential
buildings.
The impact of cool roof solutions i.e. paints on the thermal-
energy behavior of residential buildings was also assessed by
means of numerical analysis (Zingre et al., 2015). Maximum indoor
free-floating temperature reductions between 2 and 7.5 °C due to
an increase from 50% to 92% of the roof solar reflectance was sim-
ulated by means of ESP-r for a house in Portugal, with a cooling
annual energy saving around 30%.
In Akbari et al. (2005a), an innovative cool roof heat transfer
model for double skin roofs is developed to predict the heat trans-
fers for a double-skin roof combined with cool roof. The model was
applied and tested in the case of ventilated apartments in Singa-
pore. The white-color cool coating on a flat double-skin roof was
able to reduce the daily heat gain by 0.21 kW h/m2 (i.e. 51%), and
the peak indoor air temperature on a typical sunny day by 2.4 °C.
5.1.2. Commercial buildings
The thermal-energy benefits achievable by applying a cool roof
over non-residential constructions are detected to be significant
667
within different climate boundary conditions. In particular, a pos-
itive net energy saving has always been registered for warm and
temperate climatic conditions (Akbari et al., 2005a), with very
low winter penalties. This is mainly due to the lower, less intense,
and less available winter solar radiation. The main benefits are
related to (i) reduced cooling energy demand and (ii) improved
indoor thermal comfort conditions, depending on the construction
features of the building, external weather conditions, and use of
the building.
Summer daily air-conditioning savings and peak demand
reductions of 10–30% are reported for non-residential buildings
situated in warm-weather climate conditions (Akbari and
Konopacki, 2005). More precisely, the energy savings within the
range from approximately 250 kW h/year for mild climates to over
1000 kW h/year for very hot climates were detected by
Kolokotroni et al. (2013), by increasing the roof albedo from a 0.1
to 0.4.
In the case of moderate and temperate climates with high
buildings’ heating demand, the type, operation, and thermal char-
acteristics of the building should be carefully taken into account
while predicting the potential benefits of the application of cool
roof technology.
For the case of a naturally ventilated office building in London
(UK) a roof albedo of 0.6–0.7 was selected to be the optimum value
to (i) achieve energy savings in a cooled office and (ii) improve
summer internal thermal conditions in a non-cooled office by
means of combined experimental and numerical approach (Virk
et al., 2015). A modeling study carried out on a typical office
located in the same London area showed a maximum air tempera-
ture reduction by 1 °C (Bozonnet et al., 2011a).
The same approach was used to investigate the performance of
a cool roof for a public low-rise building in Poitiers (France) by
means of dynamic simulation (Romeo and Zinzi, 2013). A decrease
up to 10 °C of the surface temperature was registered, with low dif-
ferences for lower temperatures, but a strong impact on the high-
est temperatures.
The monitoring and modeling of a cool roof applied in an office/
laboratory building belonging to a school campus in Trapani (Italy),
was performed in (Kolokotsa et al., 2012). A reduction of the sur-
face temperature of the roof up to 20 °C was found, together with
an average reduction of 2.3 °C of the operative temperature during
the cooling season. Moreover, a 54% reduction of the cooling
energy demand could be predicted.
The application of cool roofs’ technology in a laboratory build-
ing located in Iraklion, Greece, revealed energy conservation equal
to 19.8% for the whole year and 27% for the summer period. The
cool roofs’ application was found to be the most effective solution
compared to increased insulation or windows improvement for the
building (Synnefa et al., 2012).
Similarly, a decrease in the air temperature up to 2.8 °C and a
decrease in the annual cooling load by 40% was detected for a
school building in Athens, Greece (Garg et al., 2016). The corre-
sponding heating penalty i.e. the increase of heating load was cal-
culated to be 10%.
The impact of cool roofs in hot and humid climate was also
studied (Touchaei et al., 2016). Two classrooms of two uncondi-
tioned Indian school buildings of same size, function, and occu-
pancy from both the school buildings were monitored for ten
weeks. An average reduction and peak reduction in indoor air, roof
underdeck, and roof surface temperatures of 2.1 °C, 5.0 °C and
12.3 °C and 4.3 °C, 10.0 °C and 26.3 °C and 1.5 °C, 4.0 °C and
9.5 °C, and 3.3 °C, 4.2 °C, and 25.2 °C were detected for the white
roof and gray roof in one school and in the other school,
respectively.
Four building prototypes in Montreal (Canada) i.e. small office,
medium office, large office, and retail store with two types of
668 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
heating systems i.e. gas heating and heat pump (for a total of 24
cases) were studied by means of DOE-2 building energy model to
(i) determine the direct effect of increasing albedo of an individual
building, and (ii) predict the effect of albedo enhancement in urban
scale (Cotana et al., 2014a). The energy consumption and expendi-
ture showed that, in general, increasing the reflectivity of building
skin can save energy and money. The maximum expenditure sav-
ings was detected to be about 11% for buildings with dark roof
and walls, where the contribution of urban-scale increase in the
surface albedo represented 4% in the total energy savings.
5.2. Cool coatings for urban heat island mitigation
It is well documented that the increase of roofs’ albedo at larger
scale i.e. urban scale can significantly help mitigating local climate
phenomena such as urban heat island, by lowering local peak air
and surfaces temperatures due to less heat transfer from the cooler
roof surface to the ambient air. Several analyses have been per-
formed both at meso-scale and meso-urban level by means of
meteorological modeling, with the aim of quantifying the impact
of the increase of surface albedo. In particular, both simulation
and experimental studies have been performed to investigate the
impact of various albedo mitigation techniques on the reduction
of ambient temperature. Most of the existing works evaluate the
impact of a general increase of the local albedo by taking into
account a combination of cool roofs, cool pavements roadways,
parking lots, and other urban heat island mitigation strategies i.e.
green roofs (Gilbert et al., 2016a; Pomerantz et al., 1999), while
still few studies consider just the mitigation impact of reflective
roofs at large scale, despite the fact that they represent almost
25% in most cities.
Among such studies focusing on the evaluation of passive cool-
ing potential of cool roofs as a urban heat island mitigation tech-
nique, there are some (Savio et al., 2006; Synnefa et al., 2008a)
focusing on the evaluation of the local impact of cool roofs at
city-scale, while others (Menon et al., 2010; Jacobson and Ten
Hoeve, 2012) investigate the climate impact of reflective roof on
a planetary scale. In (Savio et al., 2006) a decrease of the daily aver-
age temperature between 0.18 K and 0.36 K (with peaks ranging
between 0.31 K and 0.62 K at 3 pm) at 2 m in the various parts of
New York city, (US) was detected by means of simulations per-
formed with the Penn State/NCAR MM5 regional climate model
by considering an average solar reflectivity equal to 0.5. The cli-
mate impact of cool roofs was also investigated for the city of
Athens, (Greece) (Synnefa et al., 2007c) by means of simulation
with the MM5 climate model for a typical summer day. It was
found out that for a low moderate increase of the albedo, i.e. from
0.18 to 0.63, the ambient temperature depression at 2 m at 12:00
LST varies between 0.5 and 1.5 K. For an higher albedo increase,
i.e. 0.85, the ambient temperature reduction varies between 1 K
and 2.2 K. Therefore, the expected rate of temperature reduction
per 0.1 increase of the albedo of roofs is documented to be between
0.1 and 0.19 K for New York and 0.11–0.33 K for Athens, with an
average depression for both studies of about 0.2 K per 0.1 increase
of roof albedo.
Numerical analyses were also performed by using the CSCRC
model (Grell et al., 1994) in order to compute the impact of cool
roofs in neighborhoods with medium and high rise buildings. In
particular, a street-level temperature reduction of 0.1 and 0.12 K
for the areas of high and medium height rise buildings, respec-
tively, was detected in association to a change of the albedo from
0.2 to 0.5. Moreover, it was simulated that a worldwide conversion
to cool roofs, i.e. by increasing the overall urban albedo by 0.147)
will contribute to decrease populated weighted temperatures by
0.02 K but to increase the overall earth temperature by 0.07 K
(Yoshida et al., 2000). Similarly, a diurnal temperature decrease
of 0.3 K was calculated by considering a 0.9 increase of the urban
roof albedo by using the urban canyon model CLMU coupled with
other models (Chen et al., 2004).
Other studies about the quantification of the climate impact of
cool roofs application were performed by for the city of Los Angeles
(USA) Jacobson et al., 2007; Oleson et al., 2008; Sailor, 1995;
Mahrer and Pielke, 1977. In detail, a reduction of 0.5 K with peaks
of 1.4 K was detected in association ot an increase of the albedo of
0.14. Additionally, by assuming an increase of the average albedo
from 0.13 to 0.26 for an area of 100,000 km2, it was calculated that
the peak impact of the albedo change occurs in the early afternoon
and the potential cooling exceeds 3 K at 3 pm. The simulated peak
summertime temperature reductions were between 2 and 4 K. In
the same scenario, a cooling potential of 1.5 K was found to be
attributable to a roof albedo (1250 km2) increased from 0.15 to
0.5 for the same area (Rosenfeld et al., 1998a).
A summary of the effect of the increased albedo at city scale is
provided in Millstein and Menon (2011) for various American
cities, by means of the Weather Research and Forecasting model
(Skamarock et al., 2008). Based on the assumption that roofs typi-
cally represent around 25% of the urban built area, and by consid-
ering an albedo increase of 0.25, a decrease of the average
afternoon summertime temperatures by 0.11 K was predicted. A
temperature depression of about 0.3–0.5 K corresponding to an
increase of the local albedo by 0.1 was predicted for the city of
Philadelphia (USA) Sailor et al., 2002.
Furthermore, average temperature decreases by 1–3 °C were
detected during the day with no decreases during the night for
several cities in USA, Canada, and Greece (Sailor, 1995; Taha,
2008a, 2008b; Taha et al., 1999; Synnefa et al., 2008a). A 1D
urban canopy and building-energy simulation model was imple-
mented in (Akbari and Taha, 1992) to determine the annual envi-
ronmental impacts of various UHI mitigation measures. It was
found out that an albedo increase from 0.2–0.8° could reduce
the global number of hours where the air temperature is >30°
by 60 h, leading to an important reduction of buildings’ peak
cooling loads.
A local climate cooling in south-eastern Spain was also provided
by (Campra et al., 2008), by means of experimental analyses of
white-roofed greenhouse farming. Multiyear observations showed
a 0.3 K temperature reduction per decade due to the massive con-
struction of high albedo greenhouses through the Almeria area
(Spain).
A numerical study showed a maximum UHI intensity of 2.2 °C
with peaks of 2.4 °C in early morning in the industrial region of
west Singapore (Li and Leslie, 2016). The results of sensitivity tests
revealed that the application of cool roofs at city scale could lead to
the reduction of the near-surface air temperature and surface skin
temperature during the daytime with negligible effects at night.
Moreover, the application of cool roof materials at urban scale
can lead to a significant reduction of air pollution both directly
and indirectly (Rosenfeld et al., 1995a; Bretz et al., 1997). In fact,
by reducing the use of HVAC systems to cool down the indoor
building environment cool roofs, fewer power plant emissions will
be released in the atmosphere (CO2, NOx, and PM10 particles).
Additionally, the lower urban air temperatures generated by cool
roofs can slow down the smog formation by slowing down the
ozone formation (Rosenfeld et al., 1998b). A number of studies
(Taha, 1997; Taha et al., 1997) proved that a reduction of 10–20%
in population weighted smog (ozone) can be achieved by decreas-
ing the air temperature of Los Angeles by 1.5 °C–2 °C using heat
island mitigation strategies. Moreover, an offset of the equivalent
of 44 Gt of CO2 emissions was estimated by Akbari et al. (2009a)
by increasing the albedo of roofs by 0.1 in low- and mid-latitude
cities worldwide, with a significant negative radiative forcing at a
global scale.
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
5.3. Cool coatings for indoor thermal comfort optimization
The capability of cool roof technologies to improve indoor
thermal comfort in free-floating conditions has been largely
assessed (Hernández-Pérez et al., 2014a; Synnefa et al., 2007d),
many of them with the aim of identifying the cooling potential
and reduce discomfort hours (Vincent and Huang, 1996;
Hernández-Pérez et al., 2014b; Cheng et al., 2005; Akbari et al.,
2005b, 2005c). Typically, peak summer indoor temperatures
may decrease up to 2 °C in moderately insulated buildings while
cooling loads reductions range between 10% and 40%. At the same
time, the winter heating penalty may be between 5% and 10%
depending on the local climate boundary conditions and building
characteristics.
The effect of color on indoor temperatures in hot humid cli-
mates was assessed in Xu et al. (2012a) by means of test cells.
The maximum air temperature inside the black cell was detected
to be higher by about 12 °C than that of the white cell. Additionally,
the indoor air temperature of the white cell was only 2–3 °C higher
than the outdoor. Several experimental and numerical studies
showed indoor temperature decrease averagely between 1 and
2.7 °C (Bozonnet et al., 2011b; Boixo et al., 2012). The thermal per-
formance of a concrete roof with and without reflective coating
was determined with reference to a building in Mexico (Cheng
and Givoni, 2005) by means of a pseudo-transient study solving
the steady state heat conduction equation using the finite volume
method and hourly averaged climatic data as boundary conditions.
The cool roof was detected to be able to reduce the indoor surface
temperature up to 28 °C at 12.00 p.m. compared to the original
gray concrete roof.
It was demonstrated for Southern and Mid Latitude Europe cli-
mate conditions that the use of cool materials minimizes the
roofs’ heat stress (Kolokotsa et al., 2013). For instance, for roof
albedos equal to 0.8, 0.7 for the city of Chania, the sensible heat
flux is close to zero while the maximum value varies between 15
and 50 W/m2. On the contrary, conventional roofs present a med-
ian sensible heat flux close to 30 W/m2, and a maximum flux
value around 270 W/m2 in summer. Therefore, conventional roofs
are proved to send between 100 and 170 kW h/m2 additional sen-
sible heat to the atmosphere during summer compared to highly
reflective roofs.
It was also reported that cool-colored paint formulations with
higher near infrared radiation reflectance than conventional paints
of similar colors can reduce surface temperatures by more than
10 °C (Sekar et al., 2012). In hot climates, cool roofs guarantee a
heating up of the roof structure only up to 43–46 °C (Van Tijen
and Cohen, 2008). A study carried out in a school building in Kais-
ariani, Athens (Greece) showed that the application of white elas-
tomeric cool coating over the existing concrete roof lead to a
reduction of the indoor air temperature by 1.5–2.0 °C during sum-
mer and 0.5 °C during winter (Latha et al., 2015). Moreover, a
reduction of indoor air temperature by 0.9 °C was achieved by
applying cool eco-friendly paint of the roof of a public building
in Trapani (Italy). The application of a cool roof paint on an office
building at Brunel University (UK) allowed to reach and indoor
air temperature reduction by an average of 3–4 °C (European
Cool Roof Council, 2012).
The improvement of indoor thermal comfort conditions in res-
idential buildings in 27 cities around the world for different cli-
matic conditions, including Mediterranean, humid continental,
subtropical arid, desert condition was investigated in Synnefa
et al. (2007a) by increasing the solar reflectance from 0.2 to 0.85.
A decrease of the hours of discomfort by 9–100% was found out,
together with a maximum reduction of the temperatures by 1.2–
3.3 °C. These reductions were found to be more important for
poorly or non-insulated buildings.
669
5.4. Cool coatings for outdoor thermal comfort optimization
The analysis of cool coating in terms of their passive cooling
effect on indoor environment, as previously reported, has been
attracting investigators’ attention during the last decades. Impor-
tant findings refer to the effect of such techniques on outdoor envi-
ronment and citizens-pedestrians’ comfort conditions, as widely
examined in a recent review paper published in this same journal
special issue by Santamouris et al. (2016). More in details, there are
studies only focusing on the UHI mitigation effect of cool coatings
when applied over building roofs and paving solutions, and there
are just a few examples where façade and paving applications
are investigated for their effects on people thermal and visual per-
ceptions. In this view, Tsitoura et al. (2016), for instance, proposed
a combined multiparameter analysis where they analyzed possible
interventions that can be implemented during urban design
actions and city renovation in the Mediterranean area. More in
details, they investigated the effect of key urban design parameters
such as (i) height to width ratio of an urban canyon, (ii) sky view
factor, (iii) greenery percentage, (iv) pavement material properties.
The key results showed the promising effect of the climate sensi-
tive urban design by simulating important reduction of air temper-
ature measured at 1.8 meters above the ground (i.e. up to 1.7 °C)
and a surface temperature reduction up to 8.5 °C. Such data also
supported the improvement of outdoor comfort conditions by min-
imizing the degree hours above 26 °C by 46%. In the same view,
Yan et al. (2014) studied the ‘‘intra-urban air temperature variabil-
ity” due to anthropogenic causes in Beijing, where they quantified
the effect of landscape and urban planning on the air temperature
variation up to 7 °C. An interesting outdoor multi-scale modeling
analysis was also recently proposed by Yang et al. (2016) and
applied in a case study in Phoenix, where the authors highlighted
the further need of research investigation about the thermal inter-
actions between buildings and the ambient environment while
investigating cool coating systems. They studied in particular the
effect of several thermal-energy and radiative properties charac-
terizing cool paving materials such as solar reflectance, heat capac-
ity, and thermal conductivity. The study helped clarify the need for
consideration of building-environment thermal interactions in
numerical simulation model at inter-building and urban levels,
since they demonstrated to play a crucial role in affecting thermal
conditions in urban canyons and dense built areas in general.
The scientific interest around the possibility to design outdoor
spaces, e.g. neighborhoods, districts, etc. as more resilient to local
overheating due to climate change opened the doors to several
urban planning applications supported by microclimate analysis
as key driver for building the city districts of the future. In this
view, Martins et al. (2016) quantified the benefits associated to
passive cooling strategies named Urban Cool Island measures,
e.g. white and green scenarios, and they identified the massive
benefits imputable to water bodies and greenery (average PET drop
up to 7 °C) compared to high albedo solutions and aspect ratio (up
to PET reduction by 1 °C). Such numerical effort while computing
the effect of cool paving surfaces on pedestrians’ perception still
needs massive scientific investigation at the moment, while a large
variety of experimental studies demonstrated non-negligible ben-
efits produced by the outdoor passive cooling contribution imputa-
ble to high-albedo coatings in urban areas (Doya et al., 2012). In
particular, Doya et al. reproduced an experimental outdoor physi-
cal model of a street canyon morphology in France where they
have been continuously monitoring the superficial temperature
and thermal flux of building-like facades with varying near-
infrared reflectance, orientation and height above the ground. They
experimentally demonstrated how cool coating applications in
urban canyons can decrease the superficial overheating of the built
environment and therefore, the longwave radiative exchanges
670 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
affecting pedestrians’ thermal stress in hoc climate conditions.
Consistent findings were also reported by Synnefa et al. (2007b)
who showed that the key property affecting surface thermal
behavior of concrete tiles exposed to solar radiation is their solar
reflectance capability, able to decrease the superficial temperature
daily peaks up to about 6 °C with only comparing standard black
tiles (with solar reflectance of 5%) to ‘‘cool” black tiles (with solar
reflectance of 27%), in August in Greece. Large scale experiments
also confirmed such findings such as the ones published by
Santamouris et al. (2012a) where they specifically aimed at devel-
oping a new urban park with cool coating implementation for mit-
igating UHI and improving outdoor thermal comfort conditions in
Athens. Experimental field measurements and validated computer-
ized fluid dynamics techniques agreed upon an urban paving sur-
face and ambient temperature reduction up to 12 °C and up to
almost 2 °C, respectively. Non-negligible thermal comfort
improvement was also quantified in terms of CP, Cooling Power
comfort index (CP) Zhang et al., 2015, that after the cool paving
implementation, moved from the ‘Extremely Hot’ zone toward
the zone of ‘Very Hot’ and close to the ‘Quite Hot’ zone. The same
promising findings were also achieved through validated computa-
tional fluid dynamics models by PHOENICS software tool in
Mediterranean cities such as Tirana (Fintikakis et al., 2011) and
Athens (Gaitani et al., 2011). Other numerical and experimental
studies, at the same time, were pretty focused on superficial tem-
perature benefits produced by the implementation of directionally
reflective coatings and tiles aimed at reflecting solar radiation
backward to the sun without producing multiple reflections in
urban canyons, with possible glare consequences (Rosso et al.,
2016; Rossi et al., 2015a; Sakai et al., 2011). Those materials, also
known as ‘‘retro-reflective materials”, are capable to reflect the
solar radiation through the same direction of the incoming one
and therefore, beyond the urban canyon as demonstrated by
Rossi et al. (2015b). Acknowledging this potential penalty of cool
coatings, Takebayashi proposed effective installation guidelines
for cool coatings when applied over building facades. Promising
applications of those solutions demonstrated their effect in pro-
ducing passive cooling benefits both at single building and inter-
building scale, as also investigated by Han et al. (2017) and Han
et al. (2015).
5.5. Cool coatings for optimizing HVAC and PV performance
As described in the previous sections, the capability of a cool
roof to (i) reduce cooling building energy requirement, (ii) improve
indoor thermal comfort, and (iii) mitigate local microclimate as a
sustainable passive strategy has already been widely investigated
with reference to several climate conditions, building operations,
and construction typologies.
Nevertheless, cool roofs can also produce an additional cooling
benefit, which has been defined as ‘‘active cool roof effect”. Such
further benefit arises from the fact that usually in commercial
and industrial buildings the external units of the heat pumps, com-
monly used for cooling purposes, are positioned over the roof. This
positioning of the system can significantly affect its energy effi-
ciency, since the roof is strongly and continuously exposed to the
solar radiation. Therefore, the roof thermal and optical properties
together with thermal environment of the air neat to the roof sur-
face play a primary role in determining heat pump energy effi-
ciency. In fact, the performance of heat pumps for cooling is
affected by several factors such as the climate boundary condi-
tions, the temperature of the system, the sizing of the heat pump,
etc. (Liu et al., 2013). Additionally, it is demonstrated that the coef-
ficient of performance of heat pumps in cooling mode increases
with the increase of the outdoor temperature, given its strong
correlation with the temperature lift between the source and the
output. Therefore, the ‘‘active cool roof effect” consists in an
extra-increase of the energy performance of the heat pump in cool-
ing mode usually installed over the roof of the buildings, since it
generates the decrease of the temperature lift between the source
and the output (Pisello et al., 2013). The literature still lacks of
studies focusing specifically on the analysis of such ‘‘active cool
roof effect”. The coupled passive–active effect produced by such
a technology was mainly analyzed, where the cool roof capability
to decrease the suction air temperature of heat pump external
units located over the roof is quantified. To this aim, an industrial
building with an office area located in Rome, Italy, was continu-
ously monitored in summer 2012. In order to investigate the ‘‘ac-
tive” contribution, suction air temperature was monitored and a
new simple analytical model was proposed and used to estimate
the cool roof active effect. The results showed that the cool roof
allows to decrease the roof overheating up to 20 °C. The energy
requirement for cooling decreased by about 34%. Interesting
results were also achieved by Meggers et al. (2016) who investi-
gated the influence played by urban air conditioning system on
their surrounding microclimate. In particular, they identified a
Coefficient of Performance (COP) variation due to the ambient tem-
perature increase produced around the air-conditioning systems
when located in dense overheated urban environment, and they
found out an energy need increase up to 7%–47% due to increases
in environmental temperature. At the same time, considering the
wide variability of the boundary conditions affecting such phe-
nomenon, other authors produced valuable analyses of the same
possible further cool roof benefit. More in details, they (Wray
and Akbari, 2008) explored the behavior of several configurations
of air entering rooftop air-conditioner condensing units in a rigor-
ous parallel experimental measurement where they compared cool
and hot roof installations. They found out that the hot roof was
characterized by inlet air temperature only up to 0.3 °C warmer
than the cool roof configuration on average, in sunny peak times,
corresponding to less than 1% benefit in terms of energy efficiency
ratio of the air conditioning systems due to the possible installa-
tion over a cool roof instead than a hot roof.
Together with classic air-conditioning plants, cool coatings
demonstrated also to be able to optimize the energy production
capability of renewable systems such as photovoltaics plants when
positioned over the roof where they are applied, in building inte-
grated photovoltaic (BIPV) applications. The first focus was aimed
at quantifying the UHI increase impact of large PV applications
such as the investigation by Taha (2013). In this study, the author
models the potential atmospheric effects of solar PV deployment at
large-scale, as responsible for modifying the radiative balance at
the surface-atmosphere interface and he demonstrated how a pos-
sible optimization of urban roof albedo by 0.05 may be able to bal-
ance the potential adverse impact large PV-surfaces. While several
authors investigated the interaction of green roofs, air ventilation
and PV performance increase due to the convective action and/or
greenery evapotranspiration around the panels (Ogaili and Sailor,
2016; Valeh-E-Sheyda et al., 2014), just a few paper deeply clarify
the effect of cool coatings when coupled to BIPV. One of these
works is by Scherba et al. (2011). This interesting research com-
pares the effect of a variety of sustainable roofing systems, e.g. cool
roofs, green roof, BIPV-roofs, on the rooftop energy balance com-
pared to standard black roofs. Such old-style systems demon-
strated to produce toe highest impact in terms of heat research
toward the environment (i.e. about 331–405 W/m2), while cool
and green roofs reduced such heat by about the 50%. The combina-
tion of PV and cool roof effect was also investigated by Salamanca
et al. (2016) who modelled their passive cooling through sensitiv-
ity experiments with varying the roof coverage rates by cool coat-
ings and PV-panels, in a 10-day clear-sky hot interval metropolitan
areas or Arizona, US. Their findings showed that cool roofs behave
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
better for reducing daily thermal peaks and UHI, together with
active cooling demand (by 13–14%), but during the night, PV-
installations produce the best benefits in terms of cooling energy
need reduction, up to 8–11% to add to the further energy savings
imputable to their electricity production.
5.6. Cool coatings durability and life-cycle performance
In order to pursue the sustainable development of building
technologies it is necessary to adopt tools to quantify the environ-
mental impacts of human activities for the provision of products to
reduce emissions and consumption of resources. Life Cycle Assess-
ment (LCA) is a widely known methodology for investigating by
means of a ‘‘cradle to grave” approach the environmental impacts
of products and technological lifecycles (Hauschild et al., 2005). It
was developed indeed to calculate indicators of the potential envi-
ronmental impacts linked to products, by identifying opportunities
for pollution prevention and resource consumption reductions by
considering the entire products’ life cycle (Rebitzer et al., 2004;
Pennington et al., 2004).
Nevertheless, only few studies apply this methodology for pro-
moting the sustainable development of the building sector. Such
studies mainly focus on the total energy use during buildings’ life
cycle with the aim of identifying phases of largest energy use to
develop strategies for its reduction. In fact, minimizing the use of
energy is a central issue in the perspective of encouraging the
design of sustainable constructions. Moreover, in low-energy build-
ings, the embodied energy typically accounts for a significant part
of the total energy use. Therefore, it is also imperative to pay atten-
tion to the choice of building materials. In Asdrubali and Baldassarri
(2013), the LCA was applied to three standard Italian buildings i.e.
two residential buildings and an office building, by including all
the life stages, from the production of the construction materials,
to their transportation, assembling, lighting, appliances, cooling
and heating usages during the operating phase, to the end of life
of all the materials and components. The results show that the
operation phase has the greatest contribution to the total impact
from 77% (for a residential building) to 85% (for an office building),
whereas the impact of the construction phase ranges from about
14% (office building) to 21% (residential building).
A review of the life cycle energy analyses of both residential and
office buildings resulting from 73 cases across 13 countries is pro-
vided in (Ramesh et al., 2010). Results show that operating (80–
90%) and embodied (10–20%) phases of energy use are significant
contributors to building’s life cycle energy demand. Building’s life
cycle energy demand can be reduced by reducing significantly its
operating energy through use of passive and active technologies
even if it leads to a slight increase in embodied energy. However,
an excessive use of passive and active features in a building may
be counterproductive. The LCA has been performed also specifi-
cally at materials’ level. In fact, the selection of building materials
with high content in embodied energy implicates an initial high
level of energy consumption in the building production stage and
consequently determines future energy consumption in order to
fulfil heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning demand.
The capability of building materials’ to affect both embodied
energy and recycling potential of buildings has been studied in
(Thormark, 2006) for a high-energy efficient housing projects in
Sweden. The embodied energy was originally estimated to be
40% of total energy need for a lifetime of 50 years. It was
demonstrated that such embodied energy could be decreased by
approximately 17% or increased by about 6% by substituting the
materials. The life cycle assessment of five main construction
materials i.e. wood, aluminum, glass, concrete and ceramic tiles
of a house in Scotland is carried out in Asif et al. (2007) to
determine their embodied energy and associated environmental
671
impacts. Embodied energy of various construction materials
involved has been estimated to be equal to 227.4 GJ. Concrete, tim-
ber and ceramic tiles were identified as the three major energy
expensive materials involved. Concrete alone was detected to con-
sume 65% of the total embodied energy of the home while its share
of environmental impacts is even more crucial.
A LCA study comparing the most commonly used building
materials with some eco-materials using three different impact
categories is provided by Bribián et al. (2011). The impact of con-
struction products was found to be significantly reduced by using
the best techniques available and eco-innovation in production
plants, substituting the use of finite natural resources for waste
generated in other production processes. LCA has also been used
to compare the effects of three different shading materials on
building energy consumption and their impacts to the environ-
ment within five major climate zones (Babaizadeh et al., 2015).
LCA approach can also be applied over roof systems. An original
life cycle environmental cost analysis is performed on green roofs
compared to traditional roofs in Kosareo and Ries (2007) in order
to analyze the similarities and differences in the environmental
impacts of the fabrication, transportation, installation, operation,
maintenance, and disposal of roof systems for the Pittsburgh, PA cli-
mate. The less environmental impact of the green roof with respect
to the standard roof was mainly linked to the lower thermal con-
ductivity due to the vegetation presence, which is the parameter
mainly influencing the environmental impact of the roof system.
Only a few and recent studies focused on the life cycle assess-
ment of cool roofs. In Susca, 2012 an enhancement of the LCA
methodology has been proposed through the development and
use of a time-dependent climatological model for including the
effect of surface albedo on climate, since traditionally LCA does
not consider the surface solar reflectivity. A black and a white roof
were used as case study to quantify in the impact of albedo on
global warming potential in the time-frames of 50–100 years.
Surface albedo was found to be responsible for a CO2 eq decrease
of 110–184 kg and 131–217 kg in 50 and 100 years, respectively.
Moreover, an annual energy use decrease of 3.6–4.5 kW h/m2
was registered with the white roof compared to the black roof.
The long-term hygro-thermal performance was also performed
for a cool bitumen roof in Toronto (ON), Montreal (QC), St John’s
(NL), Saskatoon (SK), Seattle (WA), Wilmington (NC) and Phoenix
(AZ) climate conditions (Saber et al., 2012). Results showed that
for the outdoor climates of St John’s and Saskatoon, the white roofs
could lead to longer-term moisture-related problems. However, for
the outdoor climates of Toronto, Montreal, Seattle, Wilmington and
Phoenix, buildings with white roofs were shown to have a low risk
of experiencing moisture damage.
Finally, the LCA of different natural and sustainable cool ‘‘skins”
for building roofs characterized by different albedo values, i.e.
polyurethane waterproofing membrane, natural fine sand, and
white clay roof tiles, has been carried out in Pignatta et al.
(2016). Both the environmental impact and the economic evalua-
tion reveal that the sand id the most promising sustainable and
cost-effective cool roof solution. Furthermore, the cool clay roof
tiles solution has been demonstrated to have the highest environ-
mental impact among the investigated cool roofing skins, even if it
is made with a natural and recyclable material.
By focusing now on the cool coating performance during the
course of their service life, despite this is not the focus of this
review, some brief analysis is here dealt with about the successful
scientific effort aimed at studying the cool coating performance
during the course of the time since around twenty years. In partic-
ular, several key papers and international projects brought wide
acknowledgment about weathering, soiling, dusting agents affect-
ing the efficacy of cool coating under natural exposure. Firstly,
Berdahl et al. (2008) identified the key aspects affecting cool
672 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680

coating durability when exposed to realistic environmental condi-
tions. Then, Sleiman et al. wrote three key contributions in this
field where they analyzed firstly (Sleiman et al., 2011) the products
included into the US Cool Roof Rating Council (CRRC) database,
showing how the relatively old standard 2008 Title 24 overpre-
dicted their resistance to natural agents. Then they developed an
internationally acknowledged ageing method (Sleiman et al.,
2014) for experimentally simulating realistic environment expo-
sure for cool roofing materials, with varying the soiling mixtures,
characteristics of humid, dry and temperate climates in the US.
Finally, they (Sleiman et al., 2015) designed a sort of interlabora-
tory experimental study with acceptable results in terms of
repeatability and reproducibility in 9 participating institutions
from all around the world. These efforts, together with other key
recent research contributions (Ferrari et al., 2014; Revel et al.,
2013) produced the fundamental results of an international stan-
dard elaboration such as the ASTM D 7897 (ASTM D7897-15,
2015), where the short-term laboratory method for reproducing
cool coating ageing (weathering and soiling) is reported for what-
ever investigation of natural changes in solar reflectance and ther-
mal emittance of materials in the field.
5.7. Cost-benefit analysis of cool coatings
applications, architecture and urbanism, etc. this section has been
conceived in order to guide the key deductions of the scientific pro-
gress around this issue. The source of the following statistics data
is represented by Scopus database (https://www.scopus.com/),
typically including the key journal and conference proceedings in
the subjects of cool coatings. All the researches have been carried
out by including the selected keywords ‘‘cool coating”, ‘‘cool coat-
ing roof” and the union of data deriving from ‘‘cool coating pave-
ment” and ‘‘cool coating paving” to be found out in the item title,
abstract and keywords’ list of each document included into Scopus
database.
Fig. 2 reports the increasing trend of documents reported in the
database, responding to the previously mentioned criteria, where
an increasing logarithmic trend is identified with an acceptable
correlation level (i.e. R2 = 0.63). The keyword ‘‘cool coating” is
much more popular than the two applications (roofs and paving
systems) but the roof application reports more than double of
products than the paving installation, as demonstrated by the
extensive literature reported in this review, and for the key
acknowledged benefits produced by cool roofs in terms of indoor
passive cooling and energy saving.
Fig. 3 reports the source of publication of the research products
with at least 5 items, where the first source is represented by an

Even if the thermal-energy benefits of cool roof solutions have

been largely acknowledged and investigated both at single-
building and urban-scale, the current research still lacks in terms
of cost-cycle and cost-benefit analyses able to highlight the eco-
nomic benefits of cool roofs application in addition to the environ-
mental ones.
The Life Cycle Cost (i.e. LCC) has been already performed for
green roofs systems (Wong et al., 2003). A cost-benefit analysis
has been performed in this study to compute and compare the life
cycle costs of green roof and standard roofs and to incorporate eco-
nomic benefits by including energy costs into life cycle costs. It was
observed that life cycle costs of extensive green roofs with or with-
out consideration for energy costs, are lower than that of exposed
Fig. 2. Number of papers mentioning the analysed key-words as indexed in scopus
roofs, despite its higher initial costs. (2016-10-22).
In Carter and Keeler (2008), the Benefit Cost Analysis (i.e. BCA)
of extensive green roof systems in an urban watershed was carried
out by comparing experimental data collected on a experimental
green roof to a traditional roofing scenario. The net present value
of the green roof was estimated to be between 10% and 14% more
expensive compared to the conventional one. However, it was esti-
mated that a reduction of 20% in green roof construction cost
would make the net value less than traditional roof value.
In the same panorama, Sproul et al. (2014) performed an inter-
esting study where they compared the economic advantages of
cool and green roof installation and life cycle cost. Their study
highlighted how the cool roof produce a 50-year purely economic
saving of about 25$ per square meter compared to the hot black
roof. At the same time, they also underlined the further key bene-
fits from a societal and health issue point of view addressed by cool
roofs compared to black ones, which should be phased out from
the market through dedicated new policies aiming at mitigating
UHI. They also considered the green roof opportunity in their com-
parative study, which are economically less competitive than
white cool roofs by about 96$/m2 over the same 50-year life cycle,
but for sure are responsible for other key public health advantages
together with their poor cost-effectiveness.

6. Statistics on cool coatings

Given the wide dissemination activity carried out in the field Fig. 3. Number of papers mentioning ‘‘cool coating” grouped with respect to the
of cool coatings, by including material science, engineering publication source as indexed in scopus (2016-10-22).
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680 673

Fig. 4. Number of papers mentioning ‘‘cool coating” grouped with respect to the country of the first author as indexed in scopus (2016-10-22).

Fig. 5. Number of papers mentioning ‘‘cool coating” grouped with respect to the affiliation institution of the first author as indexed in scopus (2016-10-22).

international conference SPIE, having its proceedings indexed by
the Scopus database. The second source is represented by ‘‘Energy
and buildings” journals, followed by ‘‘Solar energy materials and
solar cells” (SEMSC) journal. Both of them are used to publish high
quality research findings with a more technical and engineering
based perspective for Energy and Buildings, and a more material
science perspective in SEMSC. In general, this figure shows how
the cool coating scientific development has been achieved a key
acknowledged from the international scientific community
through publications in high impact factor journals such as Energy
and Buildings, SEMSC, Solar Energy.
Fig. 4 reports the same collected data organized with respect to
the country from where the first author comes from, with 4 or
more items. The large prevalence of items coming from the United
States confirms the huge effort that such country has been dedi-
cated to the science and the practical implementation of cool coat-
ings, as local climate change mitigation and building energy saving
strategy. Recent items are also increasingly coming from China,
while relatively small contribution rates are related to European
countries, even if non-negligible acknowledgment is given to Italy,
Germany, France and Greece. For a better quality of this analysis,
Fig. 5 reports also the Affiliation Institution of the first author for
the same collected items. In this figure, the Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory and the University of Athens show to be the
worldwide acknowledged reference for the scientific progress in
the field of cool coating for multipurpose analysis.
Statistics about the document typology are not clearly showed
through the Scopus database, since it collects mostly journal
papers. Nevertheless, just as clarification of the high quality scien-
tific value of the research carried out under the framework of cool
coating development and testing, it should be highlighted that the
large majority with respect to the total (about 64%) concerns Jour-
nal papers, while conference papers represent the other 27%, with
relatively negligible sources of the remaining documents. At the
674 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
Fig. 6. Number of papers mentioning ‘‘cool coating” grouped with respect to the scientific sector, and number of papers per year of publication in the engineering, material
science and chemistry field, as indexed in scopus (2017-01-02).
same time, it is important to point out how the scientific field has
been considered as mature enough to deserve several review
papers, i.e. 34 items in total. The same database also highlights
(Fig. 6), consistently with the source analysis carried out in Fig. 3,
how about one third of the total items are considered as ‘‘engineer-
ing” products and it shows how the cool coating technical applica-
tion has been acknowledged as an effective implementation in the
field of applied sciences, as a fruitful follow up of the more basic
scientific effort carried out in the fields of Material science (21%
of the total) and Physics and astronomy (11% of the total). Never-
theless, it is important to highlight that the more basic science con-
cerning cool coatings is still growing its importance and scientific
production, since the number of papers about cool coatings in
the Engineering category is arising with the same slope of the
number of Scopus-indexed contributions in the field of Material
Science and Chemistry, demonstrating how the cool coating
research and application is still active under the framework of
material development and characterization, and also at application
and design level.
7. Concluding remarks
In this paper, a deep review of the existing literature concerning
cool coatings development and their real-world applications is
provided. In all the scientific contributions that have been devel-
oped since about 1970, such cool coatings demonstrated to have
a non-negligible impact both at single-building scale and inter-
building scale by significantly improving indoor and outdoor ther-
mal comfort while reducing at the same time building energy con-
sumption. A large group of reviewed papers concern the analysis of
effect of such cool coating when applied to building roofs and/or
facades, where they showed to produce up to annulling cooling
energy need reduction with negligible penalties even in relatively
cold climates. The first works were carried out through dynamic
simulation models where a huge computational effort was dedi-
cated for extending the results to several building typologies and
climate conditions. Thanks to the market uptake, also a large and
exhaustive group of works was also dedicated to real world appli-
cations, where cool coatings demonstrated to play a key role also in
optimizing building energy efficiency and indoor thermal comfort
conditions. All these results are highlighted in the single scientific
papers analyzed in this review and in the final statistics section,
where the key observations can be summarized as follows:
- Cool coating investigation is still rapidly increasing its impact
within the scientific community, described by a logarithmic
trend during the last decades.
- Cool roofs are more ‘‘scientifically popular” than urban cool
paving systems, for their threefold beneficial effect at building,
urban and global climate scale.
- Cool coating research has attracted publication interest in the
best international journals and scientific conferences with a
major focus from an engineering investigation, then on the
basic material science and chemistry/physics. This element con-
firms the acknowledged capability of cool coatings to produce a
technical and practical effect in reducing energy need for cool-
ing in buildings and for mitigating urban microclimate comfort
conditions, as demonstrated by engineering-based studies.
- Huge and valuable research effort has been played for investi-
gating the durability and life cycle behavior of cool coating
when exposed to weathering, soiling, dusting agents. Such
international effort has produced firstly publications, then also
reference standards for reproducing realistic environments and
simulating accelerated degradation phenomena in the lab.
- The key countries involved in cool coatings research, both con-
sidering affiliation and nation, are USA, Greece, China and Italy.
The key advantage of the US with respect to all the other coun-
tries highlights the urgent need of large scale implementation
 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680
Fig. 7. Synthesis of the acknowledged effect of cool coatings: UHI mitigation, energy saving in buildings, passive cooling (Santamouris, 2014; Pisello and Cotana, 2014b).
policies for better investigating and massive application of cool
coatings, as a lesson learnt from the huge public and private
investment focused on cool materials and the relative technical
regulations (Gilbert et al., 2016b; Ban-Weiss et al., 2015a,
2015b; Rosado et al., 2014; Akbari et al., 2005a).
- The most investigated effect of cool coating applications con-
cerns their passive cooling effect when applied over building
envelopes, where there are many and valuable contributions
attracting the positive feedback from the whole scientific com-
munity (Fig. 7). At the same time, their effect on outdoor com-
fort perception by pedestrians is observed in valuable
experimental and modeling studies where cool paving systems
showed to improve outdoor thermal comfort conditions.
- Key promising studies are focused on developing cool coatings
able to reflect solar radiation in preferred directions such as
retro-reflective coatings.
Concluding, at the present day, the application of cool coatings
in the urban environment, has been widely acknowledged to be
responsible for urban climate change mitigation thanks to its role
in counteracting urban heat island and people vulnerability to
climate change. Future key research directions are envisaged
(i) in the development of other new directionally-selective and
spectrally-selective and non-Lambertian cool coatings (e.g. retro-
reflective (Rossi et al., 2016b, 2015c, 2014) and fluorescent
coatings (Berdahl et al., 2016), (ii) in coupling cool coating with
675
thermal-energy storage techniques (Lu et al., 2016b; Chung and
Park, 2016; Karlessi et al., 2011), (iii) in elaborating new and
easy-working policy tools aimed at making the cool coating
performance assessment ready for the big market (Qin, 2015;
Yang et al., 2015; Garman-Kolokotsa and Synnefa, 2013), (iv) in
quantifying the cool coating benefits in improving the efficiency
of HVAC systems located in close proximity to highly reflective
applications.
Considering the wide and effective results and real field contri-
butions coming from innovative research all around the world in
the field of cool coating development and implementation, the pre-
sent review contributed to make an instant picture of the current
research progress, which is expected to prepare the ground for
another a fruitful decade of research at basic and applied level
about further material development and implementation of UHI
mitigation strategies.
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgments are due to the ‘‘CIRIAF program for UNESCO”
in the framework of the UNESCO Chair ‘‘Water Resources Manage-
ment and Culture”. The research leading to this review has been
supported from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and
innovation programme under grant agreement Nos. 657466
(INPATH-TES) and 678407 (ZERO-PLUS).
676 A.L. Pisello / Solar Energy 144 (2017) 660–680

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