A new law approved last week by the French Parliament requires the rooftops on all new buildings in commercial areas to be partly covered by green roofs or solar panels.
“The law was scaled back from initial proposals by environmental groups asking for green roofs to cover the entire rooftop surface of all new buildings,” ThinkProgress reports. “The compromise gave businesses a choice to install solar panels instead, or to only cover part of the roof in foliage.”
Even so, “the law is trailblazing,” Phillips writes. It “will both change the urban landscape of cities across France as well as potentially inspire other countries to follow suit, especially with the United Nations’ climate summit coming to Paris at the end of the year.”
