Ever since air conditioning was invented by Willis Carrier 100 years ago, its design has pretty much stayed the same. But because of the high need for air conditioning around the world, coupled with the sometimes prohibitive energy costs of endlessly running A/C systems, scientists are testing new energy efficient air conditioning technologies all the time.
Here are three of the most recent and exciting A/C innovations:
- Send Hot Air Space Bound: Engineers at Stanford have developed reflective panels for the rooftops of commercial buildings. These panels would deflect heat coming in from the sun at a frequency that would send it through our atmosphere, back into space. As an added bonus, it would convert internal heat from the building into the same frequency and send it space bound as well.
Pro: Reflecting our excess heat into the vast cold of space is ingenious and super cool.
Con: Scientists haven’t quite figured out how to get a building’s inner heat transferred to the rooftop reflective panel. - Get Rid of the Costly Condenser Unit: Scientists at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory have developed air conditioners that use desiccants (advanced versions of the Silica packets you find in new shoes) to absorb moisture created when air conditioning cools the surrounding air. With a traditional system, this humidity is passed outdoors through the condenser unit, which requires a lot of energy.
Pro: Getting rid of the condenser unit can save a lot of energy—up to 75% in some parts of the US.
Con: A second set of ductwork is need for this technology to work. - Use Evaporative Cooling: Emerging Objects has come up with a honeycomb-like ceramic block that can be mass produced by 3D printers. These blocks can be used to build an internal wall of a house, where they are then moistened with water. The surrounding dry, hot air passes through the blocks and gets cooler and more humid.
Pro: A great innovation for desert dwellers.
Con: Isn’t water kind of scarce in the desert?
As you can see, while these innovations are amazingly cool, they’re not quite as developed as Carrier’s original classic: the air conditioner!
