Green/Eco Roof

i would suggest consulting a professional in the industry. i considered one and spoke with blue turtle roofing from marin...they were very responsive...other than that i have no experience with them.

Thanks. It doesn't look like Blue Turtle is doing what I was curious about, and in fact it looks similar to Duro-Last. What I was thinking about is actually planting vegetation on the roof. The new science (?) museum near the De Young in Golden Gate park is doing this. I'm not very serious at this point but it would seem like the low slope angle of most mid-century modern roofs would lend themselves to this, versus solar which needs a higher angle and detracts aesthetically from the house.

Chuck

a couple weeks ago whilst out walking the pooch i noticed a house in the neighborhood that had a very, very, very green roof. not sure that it was on purpose, tho...

surrounded by lots of tall trees, i think it's probably just very poor maintenance. from the street, it looks like you could play a round of golf up there. while the weight doesn't seem to be an issue for that house (not as of last week, that is), i don't think i'd want to take the chance without seriously upgrading the structure. if you're not supposed to run around with scissors up there, i don't think adding a few tons of soil and water is a good idea; just what i need, more ponding water.

a white (cool) roof that reflects radiant heat/light back into the atmosphere is pretty "eco", too... this is a viable shift for most flat-roof eichler owners. i'd agree that the structure of an eichler might be compromised with lots of weight up there (like soil and water, etc.)

I've had a few inadvertent "green" roofs...or mostly gutters, in my day. The Duro-Last is quite white as installed and really cooled the house down compared to the tar and gravel but with age it darkens with dirt and such. I actually went up there once to clean it to "restore its whiteness" but I had little impact for a lot of work.

I certainly wouldn't want to upgrade the roof structurally just for this purpose, but wonder how much green one would need to have an improvement? I found one resource at http://www.greenroofs.org but haven't spent much time on the site.

Chuck

We own an Eichler in Menlo Park and are in the process of redoing the entire roof.

We were considering foam but we found an architect that's done a very similar house in Mtn View. He convinced us that he could keep the original look of the roof and also incorporate upgrades. In essence, we're creating a "sub ceiling" of false roof, what ever you want to call it. Raising the roof a few inches but keeping it flat. That additional space will carry all the new conduit for all my A/V and network wiring, new lights (for future remodels) and anything else we can think of while the roof is open. Then we can also put insulation there.

My wife and I are pretty green conscious and considered a green roof, a la the California Academy of Sciences. However, I spoke to my contractor about it and he didn't like it. That kind of roof can get VERY heavy, considering the soil and water it would hold. Plus, I don't know what kind of waterproof issues you'd need to plan for in order to keep it from coming in the house.

At this point, we're looking at all the solar options we can. I'll create a different post, since I have some questions on that.