evaporative cooling

Evaporative cooling use water features to cool the air entering the house. It includes the well known swamp coolers but also cooling pools, ponds, cool towers, roof sprays and other water features. The role of these systems - usually located close to outside windows and/or near the house - is, obviously, to cool the air entering the building.

Hot dry climates

Evaporative cooling is mainly used in dry climates with high cooling demands. In other climates, adding moisture to the air through evaporative strategies can worsen thermal comfort.

Range of application

Most evaporative cooling solutions are old architectural elements. There are some emblematic modern applications (like the cooling tower in the Visitor Center at Monarto Zoological Park), and custom and personal solutions, but few modern standards and proposals.

Swamp coolers are the greatest exception.

Cool towers

Cool towers are high structures (about 30 ft. tall and 6 x 6ft square at least) designed to drive fresh air (cooled through a water mechanism in its top) to the inside of the building, via gravity.

They should be well insulated structures, whose designs may vary a lot. They can be combined with solar towers.

See, for more information on their designs: Cool Towers

Swamp coolers

See: Swamp coolers

Roof ponds and roof sprinklers

Water roof ponds and roof sprinklers are evaporative solutions for extreme dry-hot conditions. These elements are installed on roofs to promote water evaporation and air cooling that is somehow driven to the living space.

Roof sprinklers require a pump system; they involve sprinklers along the peak of the building, and can provide a high rate of evaporation with just a little external power (to pump the water to the roof). Their results – in terms of energy efficiency - can be very effective, and the use of water can be minimized through its capturing and reusing.

Limitations

Evaporative cooling is basically a solution for hot-low humidity climates.

Swamp coolers use much less energy than air conditioners, but they require open windows (or doors).

Water consumption can be a problem in dry-desert climates, where evaporative cooling solutions make more sense.

The absence of a standardized network of technical and commercial solutions is also a disadvantage, unless in the case of swamp coolers.