EVAPORATIVE COOLING:
The concept of evaporative cooling was first introduced in the 1920’s in the heat of Arizona. Back in those days’ people didn’t have access to air conditioners or coolers to beat the summer heat. They used to sleep outside at night in their porches which were enclosed with screens to avoid mosquitoes and other insects. To keep the air cool they used to drench blankets and bed sheets in water and hang them over the screens enclosing their porches. Outside they would turn on their electric fans that would then pull the warm air from outside and pass it through the wetted cloths to give cool air inside the porch. This system for air conditioning was very famous in the 1920’s and it was this method that brought along the concept of evaporative cooling.
The same concept utilized in Arizona for cooling porches was further refined in the years to come. This led to the development of evaporative cooling systems that are still being utilized in the modern world for a low – technology and low – cost alternative to the refrigerated cooling systems. The effective evaporative cooling systems use a very simply technique which involves utilizing water evaporation along with the traditional simple method of moving air and together it gives us a cooling air system within the least cost. Moist pads surround the walls of evaporative cooling systems. The system when on pulls in fresh and warm air from the outside which cools through the moist pads based on the science of evaporation. This cool air is then blown out inside the room or house to cool down temperatures. These cooling systems have the capability of decreasing the temperate of a room by 30 degrees.
The only problem with these evaporative systems for cooling is that they make the air very moist as it is passed through wet cooling pads. Due to this the air that is thrown inside a room becomes very humid to. It’s due to this reason that these coolers are often called swamp coolers too. Now if the climate of the city where they are being used is very dry, these evaporative systems for cooling can work great. However in climates where the air is already very humid like in coastal cities, baring an evaporative system can become quite difficult. Regardless of the humid air factor people still prefer evaporative systems for cooling because of their extremely low cost and efficient usage. Especially in deserts these coolers are loved as they work just great in the dry desert climate.
Considering the ever increasing cost of energy even today these evaporative systems are great for cooling. the only prominent side effect of using these evaporative system for cooling, other than the fact of them moistening the air, they are quite large in size. The whole system is basically a large can that is setup up with moist pads all around. They are quite bulky in size and therefore require proper placement inside homes especially if the house is small finding sufficient place for these huge cooling systems can be difficult.