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Dr. Stuart Gaffin, Columbia University - Bright is the New Black

http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wamc/local-wamc-993119.mp3

Albany, NY – In today's Academic Minute, Dr. Stuart Gaffin of Columbia University explains how the colors and materials used by urban planners can reduce the higher temperatures associated with global climate change.

Stuart Gaffin is a research scientist at the Center for Climate Systems Research, a part of Columbia University's Earth Institute. He is also at the affiliated NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. He holds a Ph.D. from New York University.

Dr. Stuart Gaffin - Bright is the New Black

ROYGBV! Remember that from elementary school? As a climate scientist, I do: Red-Orange-Yellow-Green-Blue-Violet - the range of colors the human eye sees. A rainbow separates these colors of sunlight, but what do you get when you put them together again? That's white the color of an object that reflects all the colors. Black is the opposite; it reflects nothing.

But if a black surface emits no light when the sun shines on it, what's happening to that light? It's being absorbed and turned into internal energy. That raises its temperature. Now, something we learned as children is becoming increasingly important for understanding global climate. Cities bear a heavy burden of heat because they are dark: black pavement, black rooftops, even black windows. These create countless black holes that absorb light and make them hot. If they were whiter, they would be cooler.

Can humans deliberately start brightening surfaces to partially counteract global warming? I think so--and I think this will soon be a major research area. Some cities are already doing it, with a no-brainer - installing white roofs instead of black roofs. Who could object? Nice--but it gets harder as you move down. Try, say, brightening exterior walls so they send light back to space, instead of the street, or across the street. Sloped white awnings can accomplish this; they were stylish and common in the early 1900s, and I hope they come back. Harder yet is the ground level; people probably won't want to move around on super-bright streets or sidewalks. But you don't have to make it pure white - just don't make it so black. In fact, some scientists are now thinking about the huge land areas used for farming. Maybe we could re-engineer common crops to reflect just a little more light, and offset some warming. In fact, you could say... bright is the new black.

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