"Christian McArdle" wrote in message
...
The problem with these units is that whilst they shove cooled air out
the
front, they also throw out lots of heat from the rear and chuck your
expensively cooled and then heated air out the pipe. They are an
environmental disaster and should be banned.

This last may be true but it's not "these units". All aircon works like
this!

Not at all. Other types of air con units don't do this. Because:

(a) The back (condenser) is outdoors so can shove out as much parasitic
heat
as it likes without affecting the building.
(b) The air actually heated by the condenser and released through the
outlet
comes from outside. Expensive interior cold air is not used for this
purpose.


Yeh but no but...

You can overcomplicate these arguments. All aircon units consume electric
power. This power is turned into heat and this heat is absorbed by the
outside air, whatever the type of unit. Power stations with their carbon
load are therefore being used to heat the atmosphere, again whatever the
type of unit and some would regard differentiating betweend them (in terms
of environmental impact) as nit-picking!

It is true that an insulated box with no ventilation, cooled by a split unit
will need less power but most air conditioned areas have ventilation as well
and ingress and egress of people, much reducing this efficiency.

Far better to design houses and clothing appropriately and get used to it.
Hands up - I do enjoy being air conditioned at work but at home one sits in
the shade, avoids exertion and drinks a lot of fluids.


--
Bob Mannix
(anti-spam is as easy as 1-2-3 - not)