8-Year-Old Aileen Contreras From El Paso, Texas “Gets It” When It Comes to Roof Energy Savings
Question: How can you keep the same roof and make it better for the environment?
Results: When the outside ambient temperature was 100°, the roof surface was measured at 170° before applying the coating. It was measured at 130° after applying the coating.
Conclusion: Save energy heating cost to your building. Helping the environment by not dumping your old roofing materials and not making more oil products. Save cost on tearing down the roof and replacing with another.
8-year-old Aileen Contreras was intrigued watching her father Robert Contreras, a facilities engineer at UTEP (University of Texas El Paso), doing so much research on a roof coating restoration system to be applied at the university using E-las-tek® coatings. When her father explained the positive environmental impact and energy savings of a roof restoration instead of replacement, she chose this as her school science project topic.
Her father took her to buy the materials needed, but explained from the beginning that she would need to do all the research. Aileen did her due diligence and showed how cool roofs help the environment by keeping roofing materials out of landfills as well as reducing energy consumption during peak summer months, resulting in saving money on energy bills. She built mock up roof, applied coatings, and checked surface temperature using an infrared thermometer.
She won an award for her presentation and efforts. When Vincent Martinez, a sales rep from E-las-tek®, heard the story, he described it as “refreshing and inspiring to see that an 8-year-old was ambitious and eager enough to learn about benefits of restoration that many people much her elder in the roofing industry do not get.” Martinez is working on another project on the UTEP campus.