The British government launches the "White House Plan" to slow global warming

In March, the British "Guardian" reported a campaign called "Whitewash the Earth", which advocated the use of white paint as much as possible and whitewash buildings to slow global warming. Currently, many cities in the United States have announced their participation in this plan. Movement advocate Hasham. Akbari recently accepted an interview with "The Bund Pictorial": "Every ten square meters of the city's surface changes from dark to light, which has the same cooling effect as preventing one ton of carbon dioxide emissions", and proposed that Beijing and Shanghai participate in this An Environmental Campaign for Whitewashing Buildings / Zhou Yan, Jin Huiyu (Internship)

    Andalusia, the largest autonomous region in southern Spain, is famous for its white mountain city. All the buildings in the mountain city are painted white because the white color can reflect the heat of sunlight and keep the interior cool. In fact, this Mediterranean "cooling secret" has been widely used in ancient Greece. Today, people can still see ancient villages whitewashed with lime from many hills in Central and Southern Europe and North Africa.

　　 American scientist Hashim. Dr. Hashem Akbari is also a beneficiary of this "cooling secret". Akbari grew up in a small town in Tehran, Iran, surrounded by bungalows with white roofs that are warm in winter and cool in summer. He was inspired by it and went to Lawrence, California. Berkeley National Laboratory studied the feasibility of adjusting the temperature in this way, and finally put forward the idea of "whitening the earth": He suggested replacing the dark materials covering roads and roofs with more reflective materials to make the city look like a mirror. Reflect sunlight. Recently, he also initiated this campaign to the world by accepting interviews with major media around the world.

　　 The White House Project of "Three Kills with One Strike"

　　 Lawrence where Akbar is located. Berkeley National Laboratory is one of the most authoritative national laboratories in the United States. The current Secretary of Energy Zhu Diwen was the director of the laboratory before he took office. Akbari and his research team are committed to the "urban heat island effect" (a phenomenon in which the temperature in the city is significantly higher than that in the outer suburbs-Editor's Note) research, and he is an expert in building energy utilization and community cooling technology.

"The principle of'whitening the earth' is very simple," Akbari explained, replacing the dark materials covering urban roads and roofs with light-colored materials with high albedo and strong reflectivity. Generally speaking, dark roofs are about It reflects 10-20% of sunlight, and light-colored ones can reflect at least 50%. "The average roof area of a U.S. home is about 1,000 square feet. If a white material is used to replace the dark roof or the dark roof of a roof, it can offset the 10 tons released into the atmosphere and warm the earth. carbon dioxide."

"I call this sport'three kills with one stone'." Akbari used computer simulations to show that in Los Angeles, using light-colored reflective surfaces to cover about 2/3 of the road and roof, and planting more trees, The temperature in the city is reduced by 2 to 3 degrees Celsius, and a large amount of smoke in the city is reduced. The effect is equivalent to a total ban on cars and trucks. Cooler roofs can also save electricity bills, and the exercise is not difficult to perform.

　　 Akbari told reporters that the "whitewashing of the earth" plan is more feasible than other geoengineering plans. As early as 2005, the "Interim Regulations on Building Standards" implemented by California, the United States, required the roofs of commercial buildings to be painted white. Now this regulation has been extended to the roofs of other buildings, which laid some foundation for Akbari's plan. basis.

　　 Including Houston, Chicago and Salt Lake City, many cities in the United States have joined his plan, and he is also in discussions in other cities. Akbari’s ultimate goal is to start from the major cities in the United States and extend to 100 cities in the tropical and temperate regions of the world, using materials with an albedo of not less than 60% to build roofs and pave roads.

　　 Fighting for a "breathing opportunity" for the earth

　　 Now, Akbari's plan has expanded from the United States to the world. In September last year, Akbari gave a speech at the California Climate Change Research Conference. At that time, his idea was to persuade the United Nations to organize major cities to rebuild roofs and resurface roads. Today, he proudly told reporters that expanding the influence of the campaign through the United Nations is not the only way. Earlier this year, the Brazilian "One Degree Less" project under the US Green Building Council, the Clinton Foundation, and former US Vice President Al. Gore's environmental protection team, after learning of his plan, have already offered cooperation intentions.

　　 Akbari said that these organizations will help him solve the funding problem of "whitening the earth" and will also help include the movement into the "Carbon Offset" plan.

“Every ten square meters of the city’s surface changes from dark to light, which has the same cooling effect as preventing the emission of one ton of carbon dioxide. According to the current carbon trading price level, one ton of carbon dioxide is worth $25.” According to Akbari Once the “carbon offset” plan accepts his plan, the cost of whitewashing and transforming the world can be reduced to zero, and even become a profitable project. "According to the current ‘carbon trading’ price, the value of the ‘cool roofs and roads’ is 1.1 trillion US dollars.”

With the "whitening of the earth" in full swing, its limitations have been exposed. Some scientists questioned the "complete whitening" of the world: first, "whitening the earth" only has an effect on areas with a lot of sunshine and high temperatures. obvious. In addition, they think that looking down from a high altitude, the white-painted world will make people dizzy, and that too light colors and too much reflected light will irritate people's eyes.

"For areas with sparse sunlight, regardless of whether the buildings in the area require air conditioning or not, the white roofs can more or less reflect some of the sunlight that would otherwise enter the room, thereby helping to cool the world." Facing doubt, Ah Kebari said that he suggested strengthening the transformation of sunny countries.

　　 Regarding the problem of “dizziness”, Akbari also proposed a solution: the reflective material does not need to be all white, and light colors such as gray are also good. And besides using light-colored paint, there are other ways to increase the albedo of the material. Pigments that reflect infrared light can increase the reflectivity of dark surfaces by 40% without any noticeable change in color. Although their effect is not as good as white, they are much stronger than traditional materials.

In the interview, Akbari said frankly that the essence of "whitening the earth" is only to delay climate warming on the surface, but the continuous emission of greenhouse gases and easily absorbable particles is the real cause of global warming, so lower the temperature of urban landmarks It cannot fundamentally curb climate warming. Akbari told reporters, “Now, when we cannot completely overcome the problem of global warming,'whitewashing the earth' at least buys the earth a breath of time.”

　　 In the interview, Akbari also warmly invited China's Shanghai, Beijing and other big cities to participate in the "whitewash the earth" movement. He told reporters that although his main job is to persuade more US cities to join the sport, he also has high hopes for large cities in developing countries. "Developing countries are currently rapidly expanding their infrastructure construction. This is the best time to add strong albedo materials to roof and road construction. Similarly, it is not difficult for Shanghai to repeat the California model."