The type of roof on your business premises or home affects your energy bills and comfort, Jeroen van de Laar (47) knows all about that. As co-founder of Inscio Roofs, a company that collects data on roofs, he sees all types of roofs. From green roof to the standard black roof and from a roof with water retention to a white roof. But which roof will keep your energy bill from going "through the roof"? Jeroen tells us the answer to this question in this article. As well as the story of how he started Inscio by chance and about the action network's latest pilot that deals with cold storage roofs.
The beginning of Inscio Roofs
"The beginning of Inscio," Jeroen begins his story, "was suddenly there! I worked for a very long time at a large consulting firm in construction and real estate and was hobbying with Internet of Things and data. At one point we got a question from a supplier of insulating roofs: he needed data from the roof, but he noticed that there was actually never any measurement in the roof. An inspector often only looks at the quality of the roofing.' Jeroen installs sensors in the roof. 'These sensors at the top and bottom of the insulation material measure moisture and temperature in the roof. Suddenly we got insight into places where there had never been insight before.'
Roof Party is very pleased with the data and becomes Inscio's first major client "Then we actually went full steam ahead and suddenly we had a company. No website, no b.v., we didn't have anything yet. Just the service and so suddenly a customer. Now 2 years later we have data from every kind of roof you can think of,' Jeroen says with a laugh.
Data from roofs
'The sensors from the different roofs send data to a large database. From there we create overviews and can compare as much as we want,' Jeroen explains. 'We can quickly see if a roof deviates. The data show, for example, whether the roof is too damp or temperatures deviate. We then send that data to the owner of the property or the partner who does the maintenance. They then have to take a look at the roof, because something is probably wrong.'
Times are changing
'15 years ago a roof was black and ugly, that was a place you wanted to go as little as possible,' Jeroen charges. 'A roof had to have some insulation, it shouldn't cost too much, it had to last as long as possible, and above all it had to drain water as quickly as possible.'
Now that is completely different, Jeroen explains. 'Thanks to sustainability ambitions, roofs are being used more and more intensively as accommodation space (roof gardens), the installation of PV panels and the collection and gradual drainage of rainwater (retention roofs). The roof is found space. He continues, "The appearance of roofs is also very important: a green roof naturally looks much better.
Insulating a roof has also become increasingly important. 'Preferably done with recycled and sustainable materials,' says Jeroen. 'In winter, roofs have to provide heat retention and in summer we want the heat not to penetrate. The higher the insulation values, the better and the lower the energy costs.'
Different types of roofs and maximum temperature
According to Jeroen, a number of roofs are common in the Netherlands. 'Surely you see the black flat roof by far the most. Such a roof gets really hot in the summer, we see temperatures above 70 degrees Celsius, which causes a business premises or home to heat up considerably. You then need a lot of energy to remove the heat," he explains. 'You have the same kind of roof in white in recent years. And that maximum temperature is much lower at about 50 degrees Celsius. A home or commercial building then heats up much less and it cools down again faster.'
Jeroen continues, "In recent years we have also seen a lot of green roofs - a roof overgrown with plants, herbs or grasses. Another trend we see are water retention roofs. These types of roofs retain rain or release the water dosed to the sewer system so that no problems arise there. As everyone will understand, a green roof is often damp after a rain and dry at other times. But when a green roof is properly moist, sometimes due to water retention underneath, it is truly a cooling roof. Such a roof gets only slightly warmer than 20 degrees Celsius on the hottest days of summer, and that's a huge difference from the temperature of a black roof.'
This is a good sign, according to Jeroen: 'The moment the temperature at the top of the roof is lower than the outside air, the roof no longer affects the inside temperature. Other factors, such as open windows or a warm structure, obviously still do.'
"15 years ago a roof was black and ugly, that was a place you wanted to be as little as possible. Now they are used more and more intensively as living space (roof gardens), installing PV panels and collecting and gradually draining rainwater (retention roofs). The roof is found space. But that also leads to enormous risks.'
Pilot: white roofs on cold storage warehouses
In a new pilot of the action network, Jeroen is lending a hand. A survey by the Business Table found that several cold storage facilities still have black roofs. 'As I just explained, the temperature of a black roof on a sunny roof is over 70 degrees Celsius, tremendously hot. So they need a lot of energy to keep those cooling and freezing cells at temperature and to dissipate the heat,' Jeroen explained.
The new pilot works as follows. 'We paint half of the roof white so that the maximum temperature is 50 degrees Celsius. A simple and not very expensive operation. On both sides of the roof, so under both the black and white parts, we place sensors. That way we can see exactly what influence the roof color has on energy consumption. It can be that easy.
