Thermal Mass - Conditioning air considerably.

There are various ways to conserve energy. In hot countries like India most of the domestic energy is spent on cooling on hot summer days. While in hill stations and cooler cities like Bangalore, Ooty, Darjeeling Energy is spent on heating. If it could be compensated by Environment itself without much use of external energy it could save our wallets and also reduce Electrical consumption. One of the methods to do it is Thermal Mass.

What is a Thermal Mass?
Thermal mass is the product of Mass of a substance and the specific heat capacity for the material.
Simply told, it is the property of a substance that could store the amount of heat in it for a given volume and mass.

What could these do?
Materials with high thermal mass stores lots of heat in it when the outside environment is hotter than it and radiates heat out when the environment is colder.

What are the materials with high thermal mass?
It could be Rammed earth, Bricks, or even water. It stores heat in it when exposed to temperatures more than it but radiates it back when exposed to colder areas. Every materials do this but substances with high thermal mass stores a lot of heat and transfers it slowly.

How could it be used?
It can be used both for cold and hot weather areas.

Hot weather areas:

1. A iron barrel containing sand, mud, or tightly packed stones, or even water could be placed outside the home at night at a colder place. If the place is full of trees and near a water source it could get even colder. So the thermal mass inside the barrel releases the energy in to the surroundings gradually and maintains itself with the external temperature. So in early mornings the thermal mass would be cold enough and could be moved inside a home.

2. During days when the temperature outside rises, the house too gets hot but relatively lower than outside the house. So the thermal mass starts absorbing heat from the home and cools the air inside the home. This could be done effectively if all the doors and windows are properly closed.

3. If more barrels containing those substances are used in a home then it reduces the need for a Air-conditioner. It may not cost much space in your home. But could give effective cooling. It does not need to be switched off like fan or A/C when no one is at home. It would be providing good comfort even if the power supply is cut for most of the day.

Cold weather areas:

1. The same barrel containing high thermal mass substances like packed sand, water, or some which can retain heat should be placed in open place so that it always gets the sun's rays all day. The Barrel would be heated to somewhat relatively high temperatures and would continue to absorb the heat during the day. It would be better heated when it is placed in areas with no high buildings or with no trees.

2. During sunset the temperature begins to drop and the Barrel should be moved inwards in the house. The house should be properly insulated and doors and windows should be shut to get effective heating. When the temperature in the house starts to drop then the heat from the thermal mass would radiate in to the house thus maintaining higher temperatures.

3. During dawn the Barrel could have emptied its heat and and this can again be repeated the next day..

We can increase the number of Barrels if we want some effective use.

By using this kind of we could save some energy we use in cooling and heating.

It is better to have asbestos sheets as roof in cold climate, whereas it proves to be hell in hot temperature zones. But if some kind of jute sack could be placed on the roof and poured with water it could reduce the temperature of the home. There may be many innovative ideas beyond this and needs to be explored.

Comments and suggestions are welcome.