Creative Ways to Cool Off Without Air Conditioning
When it comes to cooling off without A/C, creative might be interpreted as "old-school." Swamp coolers are part of a long history of cooling off without the use of the refrigerants and coolants found in air conditioning. A/C is nice, sure, but it costs a lot to run continuously, and it’s not good for the environment. While a swamp cooler is inexpensive to operate, even in an industrial setting, there was a time not long ago when even a swamp cooler wasn’t an option. So, how did people stay cool? After all, Native Americans lived on the hot, dusty plains for centuries; ancient civilizations survived and thrived for hundreds of years. But if there’s a will, there’s always been a way. Without A/C. Here are some of the ways they did it
It may sound simple, but like swamp coolers, wet linens reduce air temperatures by the process of water evaporation. Before A/C, this was a common way to deal with the heat. Not that you should hang wet sheets in your shop (yuck!), but it’s actually a pretty effective means of cooling. Water evaporates off the wet sheets, and the wind creates the cooling breeze. It’s amazing that a swamp cooler is essentially a more powerful version of hanging linen. While sheets won’t cool much in terms of square footage and certainly aren’t a good idea at work, they once helped people make do with the heat.
Hang wet sheets and linen
The ancient Romans can never get enough credit for their innovations, can they? In addition to their famous water-carrying aqueducts, this was one of their more interesting uses of water. The system was clever enough: run pipes through the walls and pump cold water throughout. The constant flow of water was like ancient air conditioning. Of course, only wealthy citizens could afford it. As you might expect, the average home of the "plebian" or "commoner" was probably much hotter and less comfortable. While both use water, the water-in-the-walls method is different from the swamp cooler method because the cooling process is done by water itself, not evaporation. As an unrelated side note, the Romans also used lead pipes to carry their water, which they drank from daily. Mmm... lead...
Not.