Evaluating the effectiveness of the 'eco-cooler' for passive home cooling

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Bunker, Aditi and Kownacki, Karin Lundgren and Sarker, Sudipa and Bari, Rahmatul and Sarker, Malabika and Buonocore, Jonathan J. and Geldsetzer, Pascal and Revstedt, Johan and Bärnighausen, Till (2024) Evaluating the effectiveness of the 'eco-cooler' for passive home cooling. npj Climate Action, 3. 94. (https://doi.org/10.1038/s44168-024-00165-7)

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Abstract

Constructed with used plastic bottles, the eco-cooler has been widely adopted in resource-poor communities in Bangladesh and other countries. We tested the eco-cooler under controlled conditions using a scientific wind tunnel in a climatic chamber. In our tests, we used seven eco-cooler designs in 27 climate conditions typical of Bangladesh (temperatures of 40 °C, 35 °C, and 30 °C; humidity levels of 70%, 60%, and 40%; and wind speeds of 4.0 m s−1, 2.0 m s−1, and 0.2 m s−1) in 92 experiments (N = 7686 measurements in 87 short experiments and N = 23,428 measurements in five long experiments). We found no significant temperature reductions with eco-cooler use, except at low wind speeds, where temperature reduced by up to 0.2 °C. In theoretical calculations extending our empirical findings, the greatest temperature drop was 0.85 °C at 4.0 m s−1 with a 40 °C static air inflow temperature. However, this temperature drop did not extend beyond the nozzles of the bottles in the eco-cooler. The eco-cooler did not work effectively as an indoor air cooler.

ORCID iDs

Bunker, Aditi, Kownacki, Karin Lundgren, Sarker, Sudipa ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9782-2884, Bari, Rahmatul, Sarker, Malabika, Buonocore, Jonathan J., Geldsetzer, Pascal, Revstedt, Johan and Bärnighausen, Till;
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)