The Refinishing Touch Blog

As more businesses and organizations work to become eco-friendly, a new technology promises to help buildings manage energy consumption and costs. Thermeleon roof tiles, developed by a group of students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), are designed to offset high heating and cooling expenses by changing colors like a chameleon. On cold days, such as in the winter when the sun is at its lowest impact, the tiles turn black to absorb what heat it can. On hot days, like in the summertime when the sun's heat is at its most intense, the tiles turn white to reflect heat.

The Thermeleon team, which won the third annual MIT Making and Designing Materials Engineering Contest (MADMEC), hope to further develop this technology in order to lower heating and cooling costs of buildings everywhere. The tiles are constructed with a polymer gel that reacts to changing temperatures in the form of changing color, and they also use common materials such as glass and plastic to keep costs low.

While still in its early stages, Thermeleon tiles show great potential to help individual homeowners as well as businesses to save money and help the environment by reducing the usage of heating and cooling systems. Hopefully, innovative ideas like this will continue to grow and develop in order to drive environmental sustainability towards the future.

Labels: building energy, hospitality industry, MIT, thermeleon