Green Technology

Green Roof

Definition

Have you heard about green roof? No, it is not refer to roofs which are merely colored green, as with green roof shingles. A green roof is a roof of a building that is partially or completely covered with vegetation and soil, or a growing medium, planted over a waterproofing membrane. It has many purposes for a building such as absorbing rainwater, providing insulation, creating a habitat for wildlife, and helping to lower urban air temperatures and combat the heat island effect. The Green Roof can also be used to describe roofs that use some form of green technology, such as a cool roof, a roof with solar thermal collectors or photovoltaic modules (solar cell). Green roofs are also referred to as eco-roofs, oikosteges, vegetated roofs, living roofs, and greenroofs.

Types of Green Roof

At the moment there are two types of green roofs. The first is intensive roofs, which are thicker and can support a wider variety of plants but are heavier and require more maintenance. This kind of green roof nowadays implemented on top of many big building, one of them is Chicago City Hall. And the second is extensive roofs, which are covered in a light layer of vegetation and are lighter than an intensive green roof. You can see this kind of green roof can be seen in many places in Faroe Island as shown on the picture below.

The Benefit

There are so many benefits we can take from green roof. The simplest example is that you can grow fruits, vegetables, and flowers on your roof. The green roof can also to reduce heating and cooling loads on a building. As we all know, any vegetation can filter pollutants and carbon dioxide out of the air. The green roof, by its soil layer helps to block lower sound frequencies while the pants block higher sound frequencies. As I said before, there are so many benefits, I can’t mention it here all of them.

Disadvantages

Green roofs do not have any real disadvantages except when installed by non-specialists. Some types of green roofs need more structural standards especially in seismic regions of the world. Depending on the kind of green roof, the maintenance costs could be higher, but some types of green roof have little or no ongoing cost. Some kinds of green roofs also place higher demands on the waterproofing system of the structure both because water is retained on the roof and due to the possibility of roots penetrating the waterproof membrane. Moreover, properly designed and installed systems include root barriers. It is true that installing adequate waterproofing systems and root barriers can increase the initial cost of the roof, however, due to the fact that a green roof protects the waterproofing membrane from the elements, particularly UV light, the life expectancy of the membranes is doubled or even tripled, leading to recovered initial cost differentials.

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