Let’s make roads look light, beat heat

Kochi: A climate scientist suggests a colour change for the state’s tarred roads to beat the rising atmospheric temperature. He wants to replace black with lighter shades to reduce the absorption of light and generation of heat.

Dr M. G. Manoj, a research scientist with Advanced Centre for Atmospheric Radar Research (ACARR), Cochin University of Science and Technology, says there is also a need to change the colour of tyres to prevent black scratches on the road surface.

Qatar is now trying to change the colour of its roads to blue on an experimental basis, he said. “Our universities and research institutions should try to find out which colour is suitable for our roads, and environmentally viable,” he said. “When the proposal for changing the colour comes, there can be doubts: wouldn’t lighter colour generate glare and cause difficulty to drivers. But if near-infrared reflectance is achieved, the issue of generating glare can be solved. So bitumen has to be coated/modified with substances in such colours.”

Dr Manoj said a research article published in the science journal Building and Environment had pointed out that such a method can bring down the temperature by 5 degrees. “At a time when countries are trying to reduce the temperature by 1.5 degrees above its pre-industrial values, bringing it down by 5 degrees locally would be a great feat. We must note that our temperatures had gone up by two to four degrees last summer,” he said.

“After the US and China, India has the highest road network at 41 lakh km. Kerala has 3.3 lakh kilometre road network. The state’s roads are spread in 1300 sq km, considering an average width of 4 metres, which is almost the area of Alappuzha district,” he said.