Influence of building surface cooling materials on urban ventilation and wall temperature in Nanjing residential neighborhood in summer

Building energy consumption has become one of the three most crucial energy consumption factors in China due to the rapid urbanization process. Residents spend approximately two-thirds of their time in residential buildings. Therefore, it is significantly beneficial for residents to explore suitable microclimate and energy efficiency schemes for residential building neighborhoods. This study investigated the effects of cooling materials with different reflectivity and emissivity properties on neighborhood ventilation and wall temperature. The study's results showed that the difference in the neighborhood ventilation capacity of the regular, cooling, and super cooling materials are small, only 3.6%. Applying cooing materials on the building surface can significantly reduce the wall temperature (0.3, 1.0, and 1.6°C at 8:00, 12:00, and 16:00), and super cooling materials only have a small degree of improvement compared with cooling materials to reduce the wall temperature. Cooling materials are more effective at reducing building surface temperature. It can reduce the roof temperature by more than 6°C.