As Africa’s climate warms, it is crucial to adopt sustainable building designs that do not require costly and damaging cooling systems. The Building Global Status Report highlights the richness of natural, sustainable materials such as adobe, laterite, termite mound soil, timber, stone, bamboo, sand, and dry vegetation in Africa. The best building materials for desert climates should be thick and durable structures to repel high exterior temperatures, while lighter color schemes like beige and bamboo are revolutionary elements in sustainable building.
In cold climates, the best building materials include inexpensive vinyl siding, metal or an eco-friendly option like vinyl siding. Sustainable building materials offer numerous benefits in both hot and cold climates, contributing to energy efficiency, reduced carbon footprint, and overall sustainability. Traditional African buildings have thick walls built from stone and sun-dried mud-brick, which allow the thick walls to smooth out large diurnal periods.
Eco-friendly options such as adobe, sandbag construction, cob, thatch, brick, stone, hemp, and recycled materials have great potential for building. Insulated Concrete Forms (ICFs) provide excellent thermal insulation, reducing heat transfer through walls and minimizing temperature fluctuations. Cool roofing materials, such as tiles or shingles, reflect more sunlight and absorb less heat, reducing solar heat gain and reducing the need for air conditioning.
Bioclimatic architectural systems offer energy-saving strategies to improve thermal comfort in buildings in Africa. In contrast, many buildings in Africa are constructed of concrete and cinder blocks, which are energy-intensive construction techniques. Bamboo is a suitable sustainable green building material for the African construction industry, as it cannot crack, is fireproof, good insulators, and resists water penetration. Sandbag walls are strong and can even build mansions.
📹 How This Desert City Stays Cool With An Ancient Air Conditioning System
This is a Bâdgir an ancient air conditioner invented around the eighth century AD. Despite using no electricity, it has a cooling …
What are the natural building materials in Nigeria?
Nigeria extensively uses both natural and artificial building materials for construction, development, and maintenance of structures. The construction industry has made significant strides in its materials and durability over time. In the past, natural materials like wood, stone, and clay were used, but humans began researching their behavior to take advantage of them. This led to the production and predominant use of artificial materials like concrete, bricks, and metals. Common building materials in Nigeria include water, sand, cement, granite, concrete, metal, wood, POP (Plaster of Paris), glass, paint, and plumbing materials.
What is the most sustainable country in Africa?
Tunisia achieved the highest score among African countries on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) index, with a total of 67 points. In 2020, Tunisia earned one point, while South Sudan fell 67 points short of achieving its SDGs by 2030. The average SDGs index for the African continent was 53. The mean score was 82 points.
What are the best building materials for the tropics?
The aforementioned materials include, but are not limited to, steel, concrete, stone, stucco, tiles, natural teak wood or bamboo, and specially treated hardwood.
What are the sustainable building materials in Africa?
Bamboo, precast concrete, and straw bales are sustainable materials transforming South Africa’s construction industry. These materials offer durability, eco-friendliness, and cost-effectiveness, addressing environmental challenges and driving innovation. Bamboo, a renewable and durable material, is particularly well-suited for construction due to its high strength-to-weight ratio and eco-friendly properties. The Bambusa balcooa species, with its rapid growth rate, is a preferred choice for eco-friendly and low-cost housing solutions.
Bamboo’s longevity further enhances its appeal, offering structures that outlast many other building materials. By incorporating bamboo in construction, South Africa can create long-lasting and robust structures while minimizing the environmental impact of construction activities. This shift towards responsible and innovative building practices is a significant step towards sustainable development in the region.
What’s the most eco friendly building material?
This article discusses ten sustainable building materials that are eco-friendly, durable, and energy efficient. Bamboo, a fast-growing grass that can reach maturity in three to five years, is an ideal renewable building material. It is lightweight, strong, and flexible, making it ideal for building structures and furnishings. Hempcrete, an eco-friendly construction material made from hemp plant stalks, is known for its insulating properties, durability, and fire-resistant properties.
Rammed Earth, cork, recycled glass, and straw bale are other sustainable building materials that are becoming increasingly popular due to their low environmental impact and reduced carbon footprint. These materials are designed to conserve natural resources, reduce waste, and minimize energy consumption.
Which country has the best building materials?
In 2022, China was the leading exporter of cement, concrete, gypsum, asphalt, stone, and other mineral building materials globally.
What is the best building material for hot climate?
Thermal mass is a phenomenon where high-mass materials absorb and release heat, helping to regulate daily temperature swings. This effect is most effective in desert climates where temperature swings are significant. To maintain insulation, floor and wall insulation may be reduced in warmer climates. For wall insulation, rigid foam board rated at R-10 may be sufficient, but optimum levels should be determined using an energy model. If walls are concrete-block, rigid foam should be installed on the exterior.
Slab foundations should not have insulation below the slab, as omitting it reduces the home’s cooling load. Slab perimeter insulation is recommended for controlling termites, while Rockwool boards, like Comfortboard, can be used below grade to deter insects.
What are houses in Africa made of?
African architecture uses a variety of materials, including thatch, stick/wood, mud, mudbrick, rammed earth, and stone, with preferences varying by region. Affad 23, an archaeological site in the Affad region of southern Dongola Reach in northern Sudan, houses well-preserved prehistoric camps and diverse hunting and gathering sites. Concealed remnants of dismantled furnished flooring are found in 75 Central Saharan rockshelters, where Kel Essuf rock artforms are found.
These floors were likely created for water collection and were dismantled after the earliest Round Head rock art began to be created. The Kel Essuf rock art, which are cultural facies, may date at least as early as 12, 000 BP during the late Pleistocene period. The rockshelters may have been inhabited during periods of decreased water availability and increased regional isolation due to adverse climate. The earliest Round Head rock art dates back to the late Pleistocene.
What are the most common building materials in Africa?
Clay, a popular construction material in Sub-Saharan Africa, is characterized by its availability and affordability. However, unlike concrete, it lacks unified standards across the region. Countries like Uganda adopt the Uganda National Bureau of Standards (UNBS) codes for clay products, ensuring quality and uniformity in brick production. Meanwhile, Kenya and Tanzania rely on local standards, leading to variations in the quality and durability of clay-based construction materials.
The absence of standardized testing methods and quality control measures poses challenges to ensuring structural integrity, as factors like improper curing, variations in clay composition, and lack of skilled labor can affect the final product’s quality and longevity.
What are houses in Nigeria made of?
In Nigeria, traditional houses are constructed using a variety of natural materials, including mud, wood, straw, palm fronds, and raffia matting. Straw and mats are often made from raffia palm leaves. The Ijaw people, particularly those residing in proximity to waterways, construct their dwellings from bamboo and wood, directly atop the water’s surface. Such structures are frequently employed for roofing purposes in communities situated in the southern and northern regions.
What is the best material for a house in humid climate?
Steel and aluminum are excellent materials for high-humidity areas due to their strength and durability. When choosing new construction materials or renovating existing structures, it is essential to consider factors such as weather resistance, insulation type, and roofing material. Climate affects which materials will perform best and last longest, and knowing the challenges different climates present with unique construction materials is crucial before starting any project.
When choosing building materials, consider the climate where the building will be located. For flood-prone areas, avoid wood for framing, flooring, and siding, opting for concrete, stone, or brick. For storm-prone areas, choose higher ground that avoids flooding or is built up enough to prevent flooding. For building materials, opt for concrete and steel. Be cautious with materials that could create sparks in places prone to wildfires, such as wood, fabrics, and vinyl. Instead, choose concrete, stone, or metal.
Buildings prepared for tornadoes are built with reinforced concrete and steel, with underground tanks built to withstand high-velocity winds. By considering these factors, you can choose the perfect materials for your home, regardless of your location.
📹 How this ANCIENT wind catcher make building cool
A wind catcher, also known as a wind tower or wind scoop, is a traditional architectural element used in some arid and hot regions …
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Don’t know if it’s still there, but Coconut Grove (surrounded by Miami Florida) had a small shopping mall open at both ends built as a wind catcher with cascading water fountains at each end that caught and cooled the wind, making it nice and breezy and cool even when it was over 100F degrees outside.
techniques like this aren’t just good for keeping things cost effective and environmentally friendly. by practicing them, we can keep and pass down their designs. when advanced technology fails, we always fall back on older and simpler designs like this. it’s always important to preserve ancient analog designs.
Old houses in the U.S. are made with heavy timber, wide overhanging eaves, 10- 12 foot ceilings, large floor to ceiling windows, which are opened at night and closed before the heat of the day builds. This works great. Now we build with light timber, narrow or no eaves, small windows and an AC unit, running constantly, despite all the toxic foam insulation and plastic wrap.
Modern arrogance has blinded us to the fact that the ancients were far more advanced than us in so many ways. We still marvel at their creations, yet still have the audacity to look down upon them. Edit: I’m not saying that this modern age is primitive. What I’m saying is that the ancients weren’t the ignorant fools many people think they were. Obviously humanity has continued to progress tremendously, but still, a lot of the discoveries and advancements we make today are just us re-learning what the ancients already knew.
Beautiful !! Wonderful !! And.. works very well with adobe, I’m sure. Myself, I’m building a village for my children. Here in the desert southwest, United States, adobe building is an all but lost technique. I’ve had to learn it from scratch. Thank you for the inspiration! Wow! Just what I’ve imagined. Thank you.
I LIVE IN A COMMUNIST era apartment block in Bulgaria – we have a wind catcher on the roof. It pressurises a column of air down to the underground basement and back up a central riser in the bathroom where we have a vent that blows cold air out all summer. Its extremely effective – the bathroom is also a fire safety cell as it has positive pressure fresh air and 20cm thick concrete walls (NO the communists were not thick and backwards as we were told in the west)
That’s really neat. I would like to build my own home with this system being somehow incorporated into my design. I just installed an attic fan that sucks the air out of the house and into the attic so that way I can draw more cool air into the house in the fall and spring when the air outside is so nice. Thank you for sharing.
Thnx for the article. Want to argue the animation/explanation… The animation seems to imply wind enters the “catcher” and is directed downwards and into/through the building. But I believe the wind is meant to flow through, and create this low pressure area (venturi effect) and draw air upwards the tower. Air would come in from wherever (better if cool area, tunnel, shade, just outside) and flow through the building cooling it, and exhaust up the tower But definitely great to highlight and draw attention to this passive technologies, that should be integrated into our designs so we don’t depend on electricity for eeeeverything.
This is a great ancient technology. My father also said that fountains also used not only for decoration but also to cool the surrounding area. But I want to make a correction. At 2:48 you’re saying ‘West Asia’ while showing Borobudur’s temple stupa which is in Indonesia, ‘Southeast Asia’. But as an Indonesian myself I don’t really know that the stupa used to cool the area since it’s used to ‘guard’ the buddha statues inside but yes, it’s relatively cool eventhough as I remember the last time I climbed the temple it’s still scorching due to direct sunlight to the skin at noon
One important thing to remember is that these are all hot and arid climates. Air conditioners are not originally designed to cool, otherwise they’d be called air coolers. They were originally designed to condition hot and humid air. And by “condition” I mean remove moisture. Which is why swamp coolers and these ancient systems are much more common in desert climates than air conditioners. Just some random science that has maybe a little bearing on the article.
This would be more effective if you documented the temperature difference between the inside and outside air of one of these buildings. You mentioned just the record outside temps. Perhaps the reason some people are using refrigerated air conditioning is that regardless of the power usage it still cools better than this passive system.
What people don’t seem to understand is that structures like this are passive cooling systems. You will never have a 70 degree house on a 100 degree day. You will also never have a dry house on a humid day. Taking techniques like these and using it to improve efficiency of cooling can be useful, but there’s no point if people end up using AC as well to make it their desired temperature. The only reason people choose passive cooling over active cooling is because it doesn’t get too hot, or there isn’t consistent electricity to provide active cooling.
Always good to learn about old technology that might have gone forgotten. Keeping these technologies in mind even in modern constructions may bring benefits for sure. For cities like Yazd, where sun light is plentiful, modern technology (solar panels) can easily be used to power modern AC systems, which would certainly provide a much better temperature control.
These types of articles always give us the outside temperatures, but never give us the inside temperatures of the “cooled” air. I guess “cooling” is relative to where you live and what you’re used to. In humid Texas areas “cool” in an air conditioned home is probably around 72-75 degrees F. In an adobe building in the dry desert 85-90 degrees F. would be considered “cool.”
I never could understand, living in Saudi and Bahrain, why they abandoned riad style building and switched to Texas style McMansions with giant AC units on the roof instead. Another layer of stupid was putting the water tanks on the roofs of buildings, instead of underground, and under the center of the building. Taking a shower in the summer was torture, even using the “cold” tap. No logic whatsoever.
This is torture, I’m glad 38C is only the maximum temperature during the hottest days here(I used to live in a city that got 40C in the hottest days, sometimes 41C). When I’m cycling in hot days durimg the whole day or when I used to work outdoor, I can drink 5 liters of water or more. This is insane, I can’t imagine living in a hot place like that without having an abundant water supply. On the other hand I can resist the coldest days with ease, 8C is the coldest I remember, people were freezing to death while I was hoping to get even colder days. Maybe this is just natural selection, if I lived in a city like that I would probably die.
One of the reasons of climbing temperatures and climate change is conventional HVAC industry. The next R&D stage of the HVAC climate-friendly transition is a step forward from Low GWP to Zero GWP refrigerant. Water is absolutely zero GWP refrigerant. Dew-point indirect regenerative water evaporative cooling and refrigeration can substitute a traditional AC with drastic reduction – 15X in energy consumption, 20X in carbon emission and 5-7X in capex and opex cost. Lower energy consumption of air cooling – more affordable overheat relief and tackling climate change. 5X greener AC was a dream of The Global Cooling Challenge 5 yrs ago. Now there is a 10X greener (water) evaporative prototype.
I think one of the major reasons for the lack of these wind catchers in modern cities is due to population density and the limitations of tenement plans. A tradeoff of the apartment I live in is that space is created by certain tradeoffs maximising living space: eg: an electric boiler occupies half of our linnen closet, my bedroom has no wardrobe space, the main bathroom serves as the laundry. The addition of wind catcher would limit the unit space and what little natural light it already has. Having said that, I feel like our urban designs should be revised to use as much of the natural world as possible to power itself. Particularly as use of local materials and climates was key to urban developments up until the start of the post-war.
I think that this design is quite brilliant, but I disagreed that it’s about catching wind and bringing it down. Hot air rises. I believe that this is more about transfer of air at one temperature to another. Especially with the cool water connected in the lower building. The constant moving of cold air being drawn up with the rising of the hot air will keep the air flowing. And if you have moving air you will have a cooling effect. I appreciate the article though, it is important to show that methods have been employed for hundreds, if not thousands of years without electricity. And in an age where energy is expensive it is best to employ methods that use natural forces.
In the US in the 1930’s, they built what was called “shotgun” homes. These were very simple box homes that were built to have air flow in very easily and travel through the house, cooling it and reaching outside to hit a clothes line in the back to dry off clothes. These homes sadly got unpopular and considered “poor homes” so they eventually fell out of favor.
My mind is blown!! (Excuse the pun). This is amazing and points out the importance of learning from tradition and the past. That said, I do wonder how well this would work in tropical environments where there is more humidity and dense foliage to content with. Super cool! (Oops. Another pun!) THANK YOU
The heat goes up the chimney through the stack effect when it is cool at night cooling the entire structure. Once the building is full of cold air inside and out it will cool the structure much more quickly than it would heat up during the day. The cold doesn’t go up the chimney during the heat of the day. 2 chimiinies should cool much faster still than 1 large chiminy because the cold won’t have to travel as far in some rooms.
All the commentors wondering why we don’t use this now. It is place specific. It only works well in very dry desert. IT WILL NOT WORK WITH ANY HUMIDITY. Moisture holds heat. Pulling in hot moist air won’t be able to cool it down. But you may get enough condensation to start growing mold. Now you are hot and your house is full of mold.
The underground water reservoir were often man made aqueducts called Qanat (foggara in North Africa and the Levant, falaj in the United Arab Emirates and Oman, Kariz in Iran, puquios in Peru), hence carried the waters in from mountain sources. They often had cold storage rooms for food in their basements with this system (which also served as thermal mass). However, most of these openings to the aqueducts have since been closed off as the spread of diseases and pests were attributed to them much as we heard of COVID spreading through the modern plumbing in apartment buildings in China. Yes, ancient technologies are interesting and are perhaps something we should consider such as using heat pumps with such water sources but there are reasons as to why we stopped using them. It isn’t so much that we should return to these ancient methods but that we should perhaps take inspiration from them. The Romans had an interesting system where they would paint the south side of a chimney black so that the solar heat would create an updraft drawing air out of a villa, then clay pipes buried underground would draw in outside air into the villa, cooling it with the steady 55 Fahrenheit temperature of the ground. This technique has often been adopted by modern Earth ship homes but they often open vanes at the top of their greenhouses to vent out the solar heated gases rather than a black painted chimney. Note, they often had to have grates over the entrances to the pipes to keep small animals out (keep in mind that you would want the gaps to be less than 1/4 inch if you want to keep out mice so mice often entered ancient roman villas through this route never mind insects).
Most of these buildings are made by mud not by cement which itself is coolent or we can say breathable home. cement based buildings doesn’t let air pass through walls that’s why when you lock home for few days it becomes smelly if there is no ventilation on other hand it’s not the case with mud homes.
Yes, this is impressive… it’s not as impressive as you guys think to be saying that it should be replacing AC units. The windcatchers heat indoors delta varies between 5-10c from the the external temperatures. That is to say… if it is 108F decrees outside, it becomes 100F inside for the 5C difference. And 89F for the 10C difference. While the 10C is massive, that is the BEST CASE scenario. This is also not including the fact that these structures are built in dry environments. So environments that see more rainfall can actually perform worse.
account in Bible of this tech about 3,000 years ago………………….”Ehud came to him while he was sitting alone in his cool roof chamber. And Ehud said, ‘I have a message from God for you.’ And the king stood up from his seat. Then Ehud reached with his left hand, took the sword from his right thigh, and thrust it into his belly. The handle also went in after the blade, and the fat closed over the blade, for he did not draw the sword out of his belly; and the refuse came out. Ehud went out into the vestibule, and shut the doors of the roof chamber behind him, and locked them.” Judges 3:20-25
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What if I told you that the greenest air conditioning was re-invented 50 years ago? It is a really great piece about Persian Badgir or Egyptian Malqaf (windcatchers). It is very ancient, but very simple direct evaporative air cooling with limited Temperature difference and added moisture to the product air. More advanced is indirect evaporative with dry and wet websites, wet bulb limit and dry product air. The ultimate tech is dew-point indirect evaporative air cooling inspired by Nature and implemented via advanced tech with multifold savings in energy and water consumption, carbon emissions and cost. Prototypes of the ultimate third generation Gen3 are already available for demonstration to all interested parties We would be happy to provide Undecided and Matt Ferrell additional information and demonstration article of prototypes with EER 200 (!)
A smart builder will notice the rising and setting of the sun and design a house accordingly having cool parts and sunny parts. The high volume ceiling is a must for many reasons including as Warm air rises, keeping the cool air below. One structure designed to give shade to another structure. As for the environment, planting trees does have its pros and cons in a suburb. Water fountains is a must for birds and other animals, not forgetting there is in nature communities just like ourselves. Mind you have you witnessed a lovers tiff between snails. The behaviour is similar to humans. We are part of nature and we go humbly down to its womb
I guess having any air circulation is better than none at all, but who wants a ‘fan’ that only blows hot air? The answer is only touched upon briefly here @2:00. There is a chamber built, that connects directly to an underground source of cool water. The upper towers provide a wind source to bring up the cool air from the underground spring and disperse it throught the rooms inside the building. Fascinating, yet simple technology.
I’ve managed to find only one scientific paper on the efficacy of these structures freely accessible online (other papers require paid subscription to science journals). The results don’t seem very impressive” “Based on the simulated conditions the results showed that wind speed from 2.5 m/s to 4 m/s could provide thermal comfort within 50%–80% of the ventilated space. Finally, the estimation of passive cooling power showed that windcatcher could provide a maximum (9.6 kW) cooling power if the wind speed is at 4 m/s and outdoor temperature at 23 °C.”
At 0.15 shows the interior of a dovecote ( a pigeon house) which is famous. It is not even in Yazd. You also are showing pictures of a malkhafs from Egypt which were invented in 1600 B.C. you ripped off the pictures right out of of the Hassan Fathy’s book Natural Energy and Vernacular Architecture (1986.).
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For best result, when in Rome, do as the Romans do. Remember all the 1940s-’60s movies where the Californians dressed like New Yorkers? They mostly were New Yorkers, and it took a long time for the Californians to dress the way their climate makes them. Moving the wood stick construction technique from eastern U.S. where there are/were a lot of trees to a desert doesn’t make much sense. Moving from Boston brick homes to Louisiana shotgun homes doesn’t either. So, start with knowledge of various places and conditions and then make adjustments to get the best of all known techniques. When in Rome, build a Colisseum.
Watched a documentary on home building several years ago. There’s a specific length of eave at a specific angle that keeps your home 10° cooler just bc of the eaves. But of course I don’t recall the numbers yet it’s stuck in my mind all these years that I’m baking and paying exorbitant prices to keep my home cool. If only I had eaves!! 🥵
If a person is well adjusted to that environment then an only ten degree difference between inside and outside can be noticeable. However this area is INTENSELY dry to the extreme. Otherwise those adobe buildings would have long since dissolved. The humidity level there must be 30% or possibly less with a dew point well below 50 %. That factor alone would cool a sweating person due to the very rapid absorption of their sweat into the air. This system would not improve the comfort of a person whatsoever in an environment with a dew point as low as even 50 % and anything made of adobe in an environment with more than 12 inches of rain a year would dissolve unacceptablly fast.
I would like to know how effective they were? If the temperature outside a building with this had an average temperature of 100 degrees Fahrenheit or 38 degrees Celsius. Then how cool was in on the inside? I would love to see examples like this in the articles. If you want to promote this old technology, you got to sell me and others on it.
“modern day housing has failed to design to stay cool”, this is not true, the problem lies with people skipping the part where an actual architect is hired to design their house, and developers mass-producing houses that does not factor in any of the external elements that an architect would consider a priority like sun orientation, wind directions, climate, etc. I’m an architect with more than a decade experience, and right from our first year in college, all those factors are drilled into our heads through endless school work planning and designing buildings. In the US, where all form of labor and services are expensive than any country in the world, people resort to DIY when it comes to home construction and repair, and we still get stories from the US like “I built my house from scratch”. In my country, it’s more of an misinformation, people think that hiring an architect is expensive and is only for rich people, so they just hire workers they know or was referred to them by family or friends, and this result in poorly planned houses with questionable structural integrity because they also didn’t hire a structural engineer for their 3-storey house.
Ive tried to make something like this with those flexible aluminum ducts (the one used for dryer vents or stove ranges and a bucket on top to catch the wind. It was years ago I dont remember it working very well though bcus it wasnt mutidirectional and not websiteing the wind properly. I also notice those pump air when you scrunch them having a vertical whirlybird with an in duct fan would also probably be optimal.
India would also need this kind of houses soon because this summer it reached 50 degree C here in northern India, and Indians are following designs of west without thinking twice, houses are designed like we live in average 20 C throughout year, but it opposite of that, our ancient houses were way cooler and good to live.
3:08 No, it is clear and documented in history which are the Arab lands, because they were the first to become desertified. And they even developed their architecture in this article which was adopted by Iranians later on, to a new invention called Mashrabiya which you find in old Hijazi buildings and in other Arabian lands.
Everything we do causes a butterfly effect. Like farming and then that being created into a tornado somewhere else. Same concept here, using energies. Back then they had the ability to use energies, so everything is energy spiritualy and design created. We have the experimental phase and now we can really create smart thanks to God and because of God.
No real brilliance here. The most impressive thing are the actual buildings, the engineering and building of the structures. The title is misleading. Air conditioning? AC is when you remove heat from the inside air, dump it outside and re-introduce that air now cooler back in to the interior. These are just big air scoops that circulate hot outside air thru the buildings. The best result expected would be maybe keeping the interior temperature from rising above the outside temperature.
How deep does the Quanat need to be??? We need more technical and scientific information ….how does hot air go down into the cool air pocket formed by the Quanat??? hot air rises and cool air need to be coerced. Yes I can see how a cross ventilation pulling air up by causing a vacuum but your illustration makes no sense to me. More details.
this Badgir system can be further supplemented by layers of husk that are wetted with dripping water with air vents in the walls coated with heat and moisture absorbent material. Would require two fans one exhaust and the other to circulate air. This set up would be less effective in humid regions. Would work very well in dry regions. Still not an AC but better than a standalone Badgir. The main goal is transfer of heat to a medium that is inert to humans. Unfortunately its water that is slow to conduct heat and lose it. Perhaps the medium can be a superionized water. I.e, maximum ionization without or minimal change in viscosity. Perhaps a type of brine except the salt in question will likely be formed by the cooling of lava, is naturally extremely fine grained.
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A very worthy addition to any building – architects may need to educate themselves about this technique . An idea picked up from the Medeterainian, is passive, and involves a slit pipe, closed at one end, with a length of sail cloth or simlar, ‘stuck’ in the slit, which “wicks” water, down the cloth, evaporation, doing the cooling . The fabric should remain dry at the bottom at all times, but damper, the further up one feels the cloth . Just remember to refill the cistern at the top regularly – hopefully, one has sufficient water, like for the wind catchers of Iran, which you indicate, have a cistern below the hbuilding, or acecss to an artesian water source, to cool the desert air, before distributeing it around the building .
Yeah there are some things regarding old architecture that can be much better than modern architecture a modern skyscraper uses more energy than a freighter ship ⚓ although some of the difficulties with the old architecture are bats and rats trying to utilize the water down below the air catcher and trying to get in and out of the structure although that could easily be remedied.
This is really silly. Lots of cities in hot areas of the USA and other western countries had similar cooling towers for decades. Here in the Phoenix AZ area, cooling towers like this were normal and many if not most houses had them right up through the 1960s. The towers blew air down over wet pads into the house and cooling was provided by the evaporation. In the case of my Dad’s house at least, vents opened into the attic and the air exhausted up through them, which also cooled the attic. It works OK as long as the humidity is low, but when it gets over 30% or so, as it can during the hottest time of year here, it cools much less efficiently. They’ve all but disappeared now especially since AC systems are much more efficient than they used to be.
This is, under the assumption the building itself is warmer than the air, cause it accumulates the sunshine, maybe of several days, and the heat of the walls, has to be lead out. Of course we cannot cool below air temperate, just down to air temperature. But there still is the windchill-factor that humans give the feeling wind is cooler then still air, even on same temperature. I guess there are kind of shutters, to close the towers in high noon, open at night, and close in case of sand storms.
I ventilate my living area like this when its hot, I dont need fans or anything. People need to realize that ‘just cracking the window open’ in enough spots is much better than fully opening everything. Letting all the air from outside to the inside is not solving the issue, it is probably making it worse. That is why you open them just a little bit, forcing the airspeed up to accommodate for the Volume difference inside, so it acts more windy. Having a flow of rapid air is better than having all the hot air from the outside come inside. Create more pull through That is what you want if you want to cool down. If you open everything, its not more pull through, it is making the space inside the same as outside. You want to increase air speed through your living accommodations to cool it down. Dont shoot me, but Oh, wow? This is not rocket science at all, it is very logical, but people generally being stupid, it takes a long time for the general population to get shit that is super simple, if you just take the time to think. Yes, I am fully aware that I might be an idiot about some things, but please, let us argue for the sake of finding the correct answer, not my answer, or your answer. Potato post about something I have been seeing a lot about but haven’t had the proper outlet or place to vent (no pun intended, actually) it. So, here we are 😀
The two opening are often in opposite directions, however had they placed them at right angles, a greater range of wind directions would’ve worked much as we have the opening at right angles in our pipette instruments used to measure airspeed. The ancients were clever but they could’ve been more clever…
These really aren’t practical in the western world due to cost vs benefit. The cost of constructing the tower is $50,000 or more. The tower is only useful in peak summer conditions, and worse than useless during the winter. Or you could buy a window AC unit for $300. The $300 AC unit can be retrofitted to pretty much any existing structure with minimal effort. You can’t say the same for the tower. If you’re that concerned about the energy used to power AC build an Earth Home. They’re naturally at 50 degrees or so year round. Or get solar.
Where are these informations come from? So, if that would work, we also built chimneys all the time wrong too! I am amazed, because the wind has to come all the time from the same side AND the Wind has to be stronger then the pressure from the heated air inside of the house, which wants to leave the house in both chambers of the chimney.
Nope, it doesn’t cool anything, this is why: Hot air entering the tower keeps going down the shaft, never gets cold, it may push up hotter air in the house but the house never gets cooler than the hot air entering the shaft, crap. Only if the hot air is pushed 10 feet into the ground where the temperature is much lower and there is an air chamber in there, then it will work, not otherwise.