Comments on: How Did People Survive Before Air Conditioning?

By: AAB

AAB — Thu, 18 Aug 2016 15:10:21 +0000

There are some funky hippys who are building so-called ‘Earthships’ in the desert (New Mexico) that don’t require any air conditioning units:

The outer few feet of the earth heats up and cools off in response to surface weather. However, deeper in the earth, about four feet and beyond, the temperature is more constant (around 58 degrees). Here, the earth can be used to both cool and stabilize temperature if the home is appropriately designed.

Earthships are thermal mass homes first, passive solar homes second. Therefore, the layout and design of the Earthship can be completely customized to look like any conventional home, and still be sustainable.

(Source: https://earthship.com/Systems/comfort-in-any-climate)

Some of the Earthships also act as greenhouses so homeowners can grow figs, grapes etc inside. This is in addition to them being self-sufficient in water and energy, and doing loads of other hippy-type stuff.

There’s a couple of Youtube videos knocking around as well that you might be interested in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efI77fzBgvg

By: Mike In Boston

Mike In Boston — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 20:02:31 +0000

I once visited friends in a house more than a century old that was across the street from the Gulf of Mexico. It was designed with doors or windows in each wall that ran parallel to the Gulf, so that a breeze could blow all the way from the windows at the front of the house, through sitting rooms and even bathrooms and out through the kitchen windows at the back of the house. You did have to remember to open the bathroom door back up when you were done to keep the breeze going. Quite an elegant design.

By: Abelard Lindsey

Abelard Lindsey — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 17:16:05 +0000

This highlights what I despise about modern houses. I like a house that is more open. Both an open floor plan as well as large windows on both sides of the rooms. I like a large porch because I like to sit outside a lot. I prefer not to use A/C because I prefer the more natural air from outside.

By: Slovenian Guest

Slovenian Guest — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 16:47:20 +0000

We have no air conditioning but do live in a 150-year-old house with super-thick walls. We are not allowed to put one in even if we want to, for historic reasons; the kaiser would disapprove of condenser units or something... And speaking of, they used to have passive cooling towers called windcatchers back in ancient Persia, architectural elements which create natural ventilation in buildings.

By: Bob Sykes

Bob Sykes — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 12:25:39 +0000

And high ceilings, 12 to 14 ft, and windows that opened at the top as well as the bottom.

I once taught in an original Carnegie building that had this, even in my office. You could get quite a breeze going if you knew what to do.

By: Isegoria

Isegoria — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 12:03:50 +0000

Not a whole lot of that in the American South — but the Southwest does have a history of thick adobe walls.

By: Grasspunk

Grasspunk — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 11:52:28 +0000

No mention of stone houses with 80cm thick walls?