Assessment of utilisation potential of direct evaporative cooling for India

SYNOPSIS Hourly ambient temperature and humidity of 60 major cities of India were analysed to assess the utilisation potential of direct evaporative cooling for comfort conditioning. The hours with ambient wet-bulb temperature below 25°C, and tropical summer index above 25°C were considered as potential hours which can utilise direct evaporative cooling for achieving thermal comfort. The percentage utilisation potential was calculated for each city with the help of a simple computer spreadsheet. It was found convenient to divide the country into four zones (high, moderate, low and poor potential zones) from the viewpoint of evaporative cooling. It was observed that the central and north western regions of the country have high potential of evaporative cooling, while the coastal region, eastern and northern regions have poor potential.