About half of an average American building’s energy consumption is spent on heating and cooling. That’s a lot of money spent, fossil fuel burned and strain on an aging energy infrastructure during times of severe temperatures.
It’s also a problem UC Santa Barbara researchers Charlie Xiao, Elliot Hawkes and Bolin Liao are hoping to make a dent in. In a paper in the journal Device, the trio present an adaptive tile, which when deployed in arrays on roofs, can lower heating bills in winter and cooling bills in summer, without the need for electronics.