"Bill" wrote in
:

"Red Green" wrote in message

...Probably cost a fortune to make refrigs that could use piped in
air from outside. And the further south you are the longer the
ROI breakeven.


A new energy saving project for me!

I thought the doorbell project was about the last thing I could do
around my house to save any more on my electric bill... Until I read
your post above!

What a great idea! Actually I have a crawl space and it is quite cold
down there in the fall/winter/spring. And I also like fresh air. And
my refrigerator uses a fan to blow air over the condenser coil...

So how about a vent from the crawl space attached to an air intake on
the bottom of my refrigerator? I imagine one of those 4" flexible
dryer hoses would be a large enough vent for this?

Bad idea. Musty air. Could pull in some nasty bio crud as well. Then
there's the wildlife under there!


Anyway cold air would come in the dryer vent hose from a 4" hole
drilled in the floor, then the refrigerator would not need to work as
hard.

Then I would get fresh warm air each time the refrigerator ran.

Problems with this are that some refrigerators do not have fans, just
a coil on the back. I suppose you could build an insulated chamber
which exposed the back to the outside air for this? Better yet would
be the back and sides of the refrigerator as well.

Then also some houses are sealed so tight these days, they would not
allow any air to be blown into the house because there would be no
exit. I suppose you could exhaust the air back into the crawl space.

Or if the exit air vent was on one side of the house, and the wind was
blowing toward that vent, there might be positive air pressure coming
into the exit vent and this would cause the fan to not be able to blow
air over the condenser coils or air might flow backwards.

Anyway something to think about. Maybe new homes could have a
refrigerator chamber exposed to the outside via vents or refrigerators
could have optional connection(s) for 4" (or whatever) flexible hose
to connect to the crawlspace/outside. (Like a dryer does.)

A screen or air filter on the vent openings would be a good idea.



The frig makers wouldn't like it. They'd have to make an eco and non-eco
version of RFs' for different climates. Then the home construction
industry would have to start allowing for it in design and construction.
Then there's the consumer aspect. "You want a $400 frig or the same bare
boes thing in eco for $800?. Or, you can get a really nice non-eco one
with bells and whistles for 800.".