The History of Airconditioning

The battle to remove heat from rooms to make them more comfortable can be traced back to the dawn of time when men used to store snow and ice The Egyptians were the first to develop a form of air-conditioning by trickling water down reeds hung from windows – this technique was called “Evaporative Cooling”. The Persian Empire and Ancient Rome did something similar through the use of aqueducts and cisterns.

 However it was the Chinese who first developed a mechanical form of air-conditioning by having rotary fans run by slaves or prisoners during the Han Dynasty.   Modern Airconditioning[/caption] '

Advances in technology and Chemistry led to the first forms of mechanical cooling in 1902 when American Inventor Willis Carrier introduced the first electrical air-conditioner in the United States. He was following the experiments of geniuses like Benjamin Franklin and John Hadley – who in 1758 experimented in the use of evaporation as means to reduce temperature (They successfully proved that it would be possible to “freeze a man to death on a warm summer’s day”). Michael Faraday followed up on their experiments by using Ammonia to induce the rapid evaporation in 1842. He found out that by liquefying Ammonia and then subjecting it to compression, he could cool not just a surface, but the surrounding air as well – the first ever air-conditioner compressor was born.


This proof of concept allowed Dr John Gorrie from Florida to create the first ice-making machine. The term "Air-Conditioner" however was only coined only in 1906. Full scale residential air-conditioning blossomed in the 1920s which led to the creation of the first truly portable air-conditioner in Massachusetts in 1945. Over the years the air-conditioner has continued to evolve thanks to advancements in both chemistry (Original air-conditioners used quite volatile gases & liquids as coolants) & electrical engineering. Most of today’s air-conditioners run on energy saving inverter technology. Inverter Technology works by providing precise and faster temperature control – maintaining the desired temperature rather than having to constantly work the air-conditioner harder just to reach the needed temperature.

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