Conventional Roof Assemblies: An Update to a Five-Year Field Monitoring Study

This presentation initially took place at the 2020 Convention. 

A long-term field monitoring study has measured the impacts of membrane color and insulation strategy on the in-situ performance of conventional roof assemblies. The same roof membrane cap sheet type with three different surface colors (white, gray, and black) was installed over three different conventional insulation strategies with approximately the same R value, creating a total of nine unique roof assemblies on the same building. Sensors were then installed to monitor key performance indicators for the roofs, including temperature at key layers of the roofs, relative humidity within the assemblies, and solar reflectance of the roof membranes.

This paper presents the results of this monitoring work after five years of study.

Lorne Ricketts, PEng

RDH Building Science | Burnaby, BC, Canada

Lorne Ricketts is a building science specialist concentrating on new buildings, forensic investigations, and research work. His broad experience includes enclosure and façade design consulting, field review, building monitoring and testing programs, energy assessments, and product testing and development. Ricketts takes an active role in industry education and has produced numerous technical guidance and research documents as well as spoken at conferences and industry events across North America.