24 million people in the U.S. report skipping food or rationing energy in order to pay for heat. But what if heating your home could be as simple as putting on a sweater? LARP Associate Professor Carolina Aragón and UMass Amherst Chemistry Professor Trisha Andrew just unveiled a cheap and effective tool that can address climate change and combat skyrocketing heating bills.
The new tool is a series of removable tiles or panels treated with a high-tech photothermal dye invented by Andrew. When placed on outside walls, these "do-it-yourself" panels, which the team imagines can be purchased at your local hardware stores, can keep a home 8.64ºF warmer over the course of a day.
The tool's potential to combat energy insecurity is remarkable. When modeling their design, Andrew and Aragon saw up to a 15% decrease in energy costs for a residential building in a northern climate, like Massachusetts, and up to 23% reduction in a large, 16-story apartment building.
Read more in a new UMass Amherst article by Daegan Miller.