Re:Pretty Good House
by dan-robertson on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @06:20PM
(#34420951)
Aren’t new windows often coated with something opaque to IR, that way they keep heat in during winter and don’t heat up like a greenhouse in the summer?
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Those are low-emissivity coatings. Very effective in reducing radiative heat transfer. This is why the glass in a vacuum flask is silvered: metals have low emissivity. These coatings aim to have low IR emissivity while still allowing visible light through (IR light gets reflected, instead of absorbed/emitted).
My point was only that a vacuum gap is still not a perfect insulator, so it's an economic trade-off.