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Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

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Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#221

Post by mopsi »

Moldoteck wrote: post #169
mopsi wrote: post #42

The AC propaganda coming from the US this year is really strange and out of proportion. About ten times as many people die from the cold in Europe as die from the heat.

This is not propaganda what a nonsense. The fact that more ppl die from cold is not an argument against using ACs. It's an argument to have hvacs to get proper electrified cooling and heating

But it is such a strange, superficial flood of propaganda; preaching is perhaps a better word. The main concern remains heat retention and that's what buildings will remain optimized for.

My house has 65 cm / 2 ft stone walls, which makes the normal temperature changes throughout the year very gradual because of the enormous thermal mass of the walls. But once the walls heat up during a prolonged heatwave (which are becoming more frequent because of climate change), AC becomes remarkably ineffective at cooling because the walls will continue radiating heat into the rooms. The walls used to cool down during the night and provide a very nice thermal buffer during the day, but with elevated temperatures even at night, that doesn't work anymore.

"Just install AC, brooo" seems like something coming from the crowd that doesn't want to address the root problem.

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#222

Post by deanc »

soco wrote: post #215
deanc wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not talking about historic buildings that are hundreds of years old. I live in Finland - we don't have many of these. Almost all apartments are built after the 60s outside the downtown and look like concrete boxes.

You'd be surprised (I certainly am) how fond can some people be of concrete box architecture - hint Le Corbusier.

Take a look around [1]. This is what every neighbourhood built looks like now.

[1] https://maps.app.goo.gl/bMYANpDU2AGDKVQN7

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#223

Post by ThePhysicist »

morsch wrote: post #41
ThePhysicist wrote: post #12

I mean it's mostly about energy efficiency, a well insulated house is as easy to cool in summer as it is to heat in winter. Most heat pumps can also cool and new construction in most European countries like Germany is equipped with floor heating and central ventilation which in summer allows you to run around 18 degree Celsius hot water through the system to cool it, that yields around 20-40 Watt of cooling power per…

Spot on. You're doing heatpump based cooling without floor heating? I didn't realise that was an option.

Wall heating, it's like floor heating, just on the wall.

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#224

Post by sig-11 »

Yizahi wrote: post #202

I also find deeply and even extremely ironic, that the same greenwashing radicals who bash ACs in Europe are then supporting "heat pumps" as a modern and efficient heating device. There are even programs labelled as Eco or green or whatever the jargon of the day is, to subsidize or finance heat pumps. People are seemingly unaware that heat pumps are just an AC with a tiny additional valve in the pipes :) .

They are. They're also heating indoors up to 4x more efficiently than the best alternative. Nobody is opposing AC cooling for efficiency.

The resistence to cooling with AC comes from way before HP became popular and remains, somehow. Part of it is because it's perceived as a luxury (while heating is not), partly because being relatively uncommon until recently its surprising for some people and therefore the perceived cause of illnesses and malaise.

It'll go away. Because it's really vitally important, and because air/air HPs are perfect trojan horses to normalize AC cooling.

.. That being said, I had to call 3 companies in Germany before I even found one willing to sell me a air/air HP. And the cooling function has to be carefully ignored if you want it subsidized.

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#225

Post by UncleMeat »

Yizahi wrote: post #202

I also find deeply and even extremely ironic, that the same greenwashing radicals who bash ACs in Europe are then supporting "heat pumps" as a modern and efficient heating device. There are even programs labelled as Eco or green or whatever the jargon of the day is, to subsidize or finance heat pumps. People are seemingly unaware that heat pumps are just an AC with a tiny additional valve in the pipes :) .

The "get a heat pump" narrative is just saying that heat pumps are better than gas heating or electric resistive heating. It is not hypocritical to say "people who already have a furnace and an AC should get a heat pump" while also saying "people who don't have an AC should consider continuing to not have AC."

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#226

Post by soco »

molf wrote: post #91
nextaccountic wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> co-owners HOAs don't make neighbors co-owners of your own property, do they? Anyway HOA is something that shouldn't even exist. Or at least not with power to prevent people from having air conditioning in their home.

> HOAs don't make neighbors co-owners of your own property, do they? Home-owner associations in Europe are frequently set up for apartment buildings, in which case, yes, the roof, foundation, hallways, stairwells, main piping, electricity, etc are all legally co-owned. Primary purpose of HOAs is to save for & plan long-term maintenance on the entire building. HOAs for neighbourhoods, or blocks with single-family home…

What will hit you before that here in Switzerland is the local authorities which have in front of their eyes a certain plan for your building, and anything not on the plan (in this case the AC unit) will need a permit. It's not an easy task, I would say impossible actually, to get such a permit, unless you find a way to redesign the whole facade in a acceptable way (units poking out doesn't count as acceptable).

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#227

Post by alsanan »

The real huge problem has been abandoning all ancient techniques used to passively cool buildings (provenzal well, wind towers, crossed ventilation, pressure differential,...) when AC was invented. The industry loves maintenance. The price will be paid now: low and expensive energy and unnecessary deaths.

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#228

Post by piskov »

t_mahmood wrote: post #162
piskov wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cooling the air by definition raises the humidity :-) Dehumidifier mode in AC works by cooling the air below the dew point, removing the condensation, then warming the air up (either by itself or literally heating it up)

But for dehumidifier in AC, the heat is dispensed through the outdoor unit, so end result actually cools the house. I use our AC in dehumidifier mode, also, as I understand it has less power consumption (please correct me if I am wrong). In my experience, it cools down the room pretty well

Suppose you have 27C with with 65% humidity.

Due point for that air is 19.8C. Meaning it reaches 100% relative humidity at this point. If cooled even more, water condensates from air into droplets.

—

What this means: if you cool that air to 22 degrees (instead of 19.8) it will reach 87% humidity without loosing any water to the outside.

—

That’s why we need humidifiers in winter as the opposite thing happens: if we heat cold air that has 80% relative humidity to room temperature it will drop its humidity to 20%

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#229

Post by mstaoru »

For me the hardest part is sleeping. I can cope with heat during the day, but even with good bedding, mattress, windows open, fans, etc. the body traps heat underneath and if it's hot outside it's just impossible to sleep. I was like a zombie for 2 months this year. And sleep deprivation in general has a ton of adverse health effects.

Unfortunately, I do live in a "heritage" building so split unit is a no-no. Midea pre-filled mini-splits went from €700 to 2000-3000+ and months of lead time. It's crazy.

Re: Air Conditioning Is Not a Luxury, It Is a Necessity

#230

Post by piskov »

raincom wrote: post #209
t_mahmood wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But for dehumidifier in AC, the heat is dispensed through the outdoor unit, so end result actually cools the house. I use our AC in dehumidifier mode, also, as I understand it has less power consumption (please correct me if I am wrong). In my experience, it cools down the room pretty well

I won't say "less power consumption". Definitely, not more consumption if efficient controls and motors are used (ECM motors for air handlers, VFD compressors). The real problem is the repair costs of these advanced units in the developed countries. Carrier wanted $8k for a new control board for a residential unit in the US. Same thing for ECM/VFD.

There is nothing “advanced” about this. It is just cooling the air below the dew point.

Same water tray and a hose for water condensate.

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