The earth is getting hotter, but we’ll be damned if we let that affect our love of sitting in exposed metal boxes with big greenhouse-like windows. We’ll keep cranking the AC as our interiors get hotter and hotter, but now Nissan has a new method to keep you cool: Fancy high-tech paint that claims to reduce temperatures.
The paint, a collaboration with a cooling company called Radi-Cool, contains “synthetic composite materials with structures that exhibit properties not usually found in nature.” These materials apparently reflect infrared rays rather than absorbing them and somehow manage to emit waves that repel solar rays before they ever reach the car. This sounds like the sort of thing that a Greek god would punish as hubris, but I guess that’s just where paint science is now.
Nissan claims the new paint has shown reductions of nearly 22 degrees Fahrenheit on the exterior of a car, and 9 degrees inside, which is nothing to sneeze at. Imagine your interior on an 80-degree day relative to a day that’s 71 out — I much prefer the latter.
Currently, it seems the cost of this paint is primarily in thickness and weight. According to Nissan, current prototypes are being painted six times thicker than a standard car — though the manufacturer claims to be working toward thinner coatings with the same effect. As for its actual cost, in materials and work and to an eventual end buyer, the company hasn’t yet given any estimate. It does, however, give a hint: The paint is angled more toward vans, trucks, and ambulances than consumer cars.
Passively keeping car interiors cool, rather than relying on energy-costly air conditioning, would be a massive benefit to drivers in our heating world. With any luck, this fancy paint won’t just be limited to professional vehicles with fleet budgets. And, if we’re really lucky, we might be able to get it in a color other than white.