Quote:
Painting the concrete walls with an IR reflective masonry paint such as TEX•COTE® SUPER•COTE™ COOLWALL Systems® or EnerG H.R. Architectural might be worthwhile looking into
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The effectiveness, especially the long term effectiveness, of IR reflective paints and their cost-effectiveness compared to other methods remains in question.

The same is true of metalized radiant heat barriers in that if they get dust or crud on them, or there is no space to radiate to, their effectiveness drops. Doesn't mean they aren't useful or can't be used. It means you have to employ them carefully, maintain reasonable expectations, and take the marketing hype with a grain of salt.

The military uses some IR paint that runs north of $100 a gallon that works quite well. But it has to be applied quite thick to meet specs so it takes a lot of paint to do any job.

It has been noted that something as simple as painting a wall exposed to direct sunshine with any good quality white paint drops its thermal uptake. This can be seen on a hot summer day when the blacktop will take the skin off your feet but you can walk on the white lines without serious damage.

http://www.colormatters.com/energymatters.html

Point being that while high-tech paints may gain you a few extra percentage pints you can get most of their benefits, at a fraction of their cost, with common paint you can buy at the local hardware store without sending big bucks.

The same is true of roofing. White shingles absorb a fraction of the energy that dark ones do. Problem is that dark shingles make the roof look smaller, and by comparison the house larger and more valuable. A dark roof increases the sales price while increasing the energy use.