Have You Tried Using Cheese?
And in brief British heatwave news:
Dr Ben Roberts, a senior lecturer in healthy buildings at Loughborough University, said applying yoghurt to the outside of windows can lower the temperature by up to 3.5C.
It was a month-long experiment. Behold your taxes at work.
In May, Dr Roberts and PhD student Niloo Todeh-Kharman conducted an experiment on two identical test houses at Loughborough University by putting yoghurt on the windows of one, but not the other. The experiment found the indoor temperature of the house with yoghurt on the windows was on average 0.6C cooler, but up to a maximum of 3.5C cooler when it was “hot and sunny.”
And before you ask,
[Dr Roberts] told the BBC the yoghurt smells for “30 seconds when drying” but that as soon as it has dried “the smell disappears.”
Oh, and should you be tempted:
For their experiment, the scientists at Loughborough University used a supermarket-brand of Greek yoghurt that has a fat percentage of about 10%.
Do let us know how it goes.
Should clarity be required, this is not some miraculous property of yoghurt, even of Greek yoghurt at 10% fat. It’s merely a function of any substance that can be smeared onto windows before drying white. Presumably, similar effects could be achieved by gluing toilet paper onto your windows, which would also alert neighbours to your cunning. Or by purchasing any of the commercially available window films that do much the same thing, only better.
Consider this an open thread. Share ye, and so forth.
Amazed they had a whole month of hot weather.
[ Looks out of window at dull, overcast sky. ]
Given the amount of 10% fat Greek yoghurt required, and the possibility of repeated applications, and the issues regarding the eventual removal of said substance, it seems entirely plausible that buying commercial UV window sheets, which can be had for £7, would actually be the cheaper option.
Light colored mud? Clay? Chalk mixed with water?
Surely anything other than an edible.
[ Starts nailing cheese and toilet paper to windows. ]
Just curious … did they measure the ‘albedo’ of the particular yoghurt used in the experiment? I expect Cherry yoghurt has a somewhat higher albedo than plain yoghurt, and may not reflect the heat as well.
Lower, surely?
But clearly, we need months of taxpayer funding to find out.
The words insult and injury come to mind.
A solution in search of a problem.
Well, at best, a bizarrely impractical solution – of a sort – to a problem that was solved quite effectively, and cheaply, decades ago.
I don’t put YAH-gurt on my windows. Here in the States we use YOH-gurt. Big difference.
Whoops … lower albedo. So much for my sciency memory.
Pepperidge Farms remembers when David was complaining about dew points in the low 60s. :-p
[ Unintelligible muttering. ]
When it comes to ClimateChange™ there is nothing so stupid that it won’t get funding (if you are of the correct political persuasion, it’s all about wealth redistribution).
What if I want to actually see through my windows?
Don’t harsh his vibe, man.
Ooh! He has an MSc in Energy Policy! So, advanced degrees in policy bullshit.
He looks pretty much like you might expect.
The stupider the better, because that’s academia today.
Also the crazy idea of awnings to block direct sunlight.
Marginally related: I’m currently in a long-term project to persuade people in my HOA of the financial benefits of replacing their 40-year-old windows with modern replacements which radically reduce transmission of ultraviolet and heat.
Unlimited lucrative income sources for useless people.
Didn’t Bastiat write, long ago, about rent seeking?
One not covered in yoghurt?
As does utter selfishness.
…senior lecturer in healthy buildings…
“Senior”, I suppose for a field made up last week, maybe.
Back to the divorce upstream…
A fan of woo of all sorts, it seems.
Just closed his eyes and sired the two kids for England, I guess.
I know, right, because people choose to have cancer.
Regardless, one would think that violating the marriage contract via inability to cleave unto the lesser vessel by deciding you need to swap out your AC for DC would be an open and shut case of “Get out of my courtroom”.
“Reasonable”. Lifting mightier than old Atlas himself.
If this information gets out it’ll be curtains for the, er, curtain industry.
…it seems entirely plausible that buying commercial UV window sheets, which can be had for £7, would actually be the cheaper option.
Where is the post-apocalyptic, improvisation-out-of-necessity drama in purchasing an off-the-shelf solution such as that?
…it seems entirely plausible that buying commercial UV window sheets, which can be had for £7, would actually be the cheaper option.
There is always the trailer park special, aluminum foil, extra benefit as it is reusable for other purposes.
OT but in case you were wondering… How to sell to the Negro. Circa 1954. The short version.
I suppose the question is which will be harder to come by in this post-apocalyptic wasteland. UV window film, £7 a roll on Amazon, or catering quantities of 10%-fat Greek yoghurt?
#TensionMounts
“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.”
An academic in search of funding.