Is France a country that’s interested in going green? It certainly seems that way as the country has recently added wind turbines to the iconic Eiffel Tower to help make it more self-sustaining, and now thanks to a new decree, it would seem that rooftops of buildings in commercial zones will now have to choose – either lay out solar panels or put plants in its place.
This isn’t so much about aesthetics but rather it is about the potential energy-savings. Having a green roof will help reduce the amount of energy needed to heat a building during the winter and to cool it in the summer. Ecologists are also saying that a green roof will help with nature in the sense that it will give birds a place to nest in an area that might otherwise be known as a concrete jungle.
However this is only if that particular building chooses to use plants instead of solar panels. Solar panels have advantages of their own, naturally, and can be used to help provide sustainable energy to the building to power certain facilities, which in turn could also help reduce the overall electricity bill.
Previously activists had called for all new buildings, regardless if they were residential or commercial, to have solar panels or plants installed on the rooftop, but the Socialist government managed to convince them to limit their scope to just commercial buildings, but who knows, if this proves to be effective, perhaps homeowners can start looking into green roofs of their own.
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