Passive Solar Cooling
In this type of cooling solar thermal energy is not used directly to create a cold environment or drive any direct cooling processes. Instead, solar building design aims at slowing the rate of heat transfer into a building in the summer, and improving the removal of unwanted heat. It involves a good understanding of the mechanisms of heat transfer: heat conduction, convective heat transfer, and thermal radiation, the latter primarily from the sun.
For example, a sign of poor thermal design is an attic that gets hotter in summer than the peak outside air temperature. This can be significantly reduced or eliminated with a cool roof or a green roof, which can reduce the roof surface temperature by 70 °F (40 °C) in summer. A radiant barrier and an air gap below the roof will block about 97% of downward radiation from roof cladding heated by the sun.
Passive solar cooling is much easier to achieve in new construction than by adapting existing buildings. There are many design specifics involved in passive solar cooling. It is a primary element of designing a zero energy building in a hot climate.
Read more about this topic: Solar Air Conditioning
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