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Air-conditioning technology

Introduction

Air-conditioning technology is technology that creates and maintains comfortable ambient conditions in a room in terms of temperature, humidity and air quality.

Image Copyright: AHK Baltikum

© AHK Baltikum

These technologies include air-conditioning systems that convey heat into (heating systems) or out of (cooling systems) a room (for example, using airflow or ventilation technology) or systems that increase or reduce humidity by conducting air or water as heat carriers.

When planning to construct a new building, it makes sense to install an air-conditioning system tailored to suit the requirements of the specific building. The operating costs should also be as low as possible and the energy used as efficiently as possible. Most importantly of all, regulation and control of the various technologies used should be co-ordinated as efficiently as possible.

Air conditioning based on efficient systems and renewable energies can be very energy-efficient. German companies have expertise in the two key areas, which are outlined below.

With heat recovery ventilation, the energy content of the air extracted by the ventilation system is used to heat the air entering the building. The fresh air supply is usually pre-warmed during cold weather. During warm weather, particularly efficient ventilation systems use the evaporative heat loss to cool the air supply. Another option is heat recovery from waste water. For example, warm waste water (from showering etc.) can be used by heat exchangers to heat cold water, thereby saving energy, costs and CO2 emissions.

In addition to the solar energy that can be used to heat water and support room heating, any excess energy generated during the summer months can be used to cool a building. This approach works well because a building's cooling requirement increases in tandem with the amount of solar energy that can be generated, which means that the greatest cooling effects can be achieved when they are most needed.

For this purpose, a thermal cooling machine can be used in conjunction with a solar heating system. Unlike conventional cooling machines (i.e. compression cooling machines), this uses a thermal compressor. The advantages of these machines over conventional cooling machines are that cooling agents, which are harmful to the environment, are not required and that environmental heat instead of valuable energy (usually electricity) is used to operate the compressor.

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