In an effort to help with cooling the planet, scientists have created the whitest white paint ever. In a similar way to the formation of Vantablack – the blackest black paint, this paint has a variety of uses.
This paint is so reflective, it can cool surfaces it is painted onto by as much as 10.6°C. This paint reflects up to 98.1% of light hitting it.
In a warming planet, being able to cool things without energy is essential.
The manufacturers estimate that painting a 1000 square foot roof in this paint will give you the cooling power of about 10kw – more powerful than the air conditioning used by most houses. Currently, around 10% of electricity is used for cooling. On current trends, this is expected to grow to 40% by 2050.
Currently there is a lot of effort going into reducing energy used for heating, but it is clear that this effort also needs to go into cooling.