We are all aware of the harmful effects of global warming, but there can be many ways to prevent global warming. Although we can’t prevent global warming completely, we can sure help to reduce the intensity of the future effects of global warming.

Here are some steps that we can take in our daily lives to prevent global warming effects.

• Use transportation only for travelling to far off areas. Try walking for short journeys or using a bicycle more frequently.
• Share transportation and do car-pooling whenever possible.
• Drive in the correct gear to reduce fuel usage. Keep all windows shut on warm days if you have air conditioning to maximize fuel efficiency.
• Consider purchasing a hybrid or electric vehicle when looking for a new car.

A British Thermal Unit (BTU) is the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of 0.45 kg (1 pound) of water by 1 degree Fahrenheit (0.56 degrees Celsius). To be precise, 1 BTU is equal to 1,055 Joules and in heating or cooling terms, 1 ton equals 12000 BTU.

A 2000 square-foot house may require a 5-ton (60,000 BTU) air conditioning system. A typical window-type air conditioner has a rating of 10, 000 BTU. Therefore, you might need 30 BTU per square foot, but these are all rough estimates.

The Energy Efficiency Rating (EER) of an air conditioner is its BTU rating over its wattage. For example, if a 10,000-BTU air conditioner consumes 1,200 watts, its EER will be 10000/1200 which will equal to 8.3. Normally a higher EER comes with a higher price.

Suppose that you had to chose between these two 10,000 BTU units.

Unit 1 having:

- EER of 8.3

- Consumption of 1200 watts

Unit 2 having:

- EER of 10

- Consumption of 1000 watts

And the price difference is $100. To find out which unit is more economical, you will have to find out how many hours per year you will be using the unit, and how much a kilowatt-hour will cost in your area of living.

Lets say you decide to use the air conditioner for four months in a year, i.e. in the summer season only and supposing that we use it for 6 hours daily. Taking the cost in your area as $0.10 kWh, the difference in energy consumption for the two units will be as follows:

For unit 1:

- number of hours in 4 months

4 x 30 days x 6 hrs/day = 720 hrs

- 720 x 1200/ 1000 x $0.10 = $ 86.4

For unit 2:

- number of hours remains the same as above i.e. 720 hours

- 720 x 1000/1000 x $0.10 = $ 72

Therefore, the difference between the two becomes:

- $86.4 – $72 = $14.4

what you have to understand is that as the difference between the two is of 200 watts, i.e. 1200- 1000 = 200 watts, for every 5 hours the less expensive unit will consume an additional kWh and therefore $0.10 more than the more expensive unit.

And as the more expensive unit costs $100 more, it will take about seven years for the more expensive unit to break even.

Air conditioners come in many types and sizes, made with respect to the areas they are required to cool. Window type air conditioners, as the name suggests, are made small enough to fit in a window and are appropriate to cool a small room. If you take off the cover from a window unit, you’ll find that it contains the following:

• Compressor
• An expansion valve
• A hot coil (on the outside)
• A chilled coil (on the inside)
• Two fans
• A control unit

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An air conditioner may be one of the best inventions of mankind, but very few people know about the basic working of this fine creation. Many people tend to think that air conditioners simply blow cool air into the room. What actually happens is that the air conditioner sucks in the warm air from your room and converts it into cool air that is blown back inside the room and thus a hot room is converted into a cool one. This cycle is repeated until the desired room temperature that you have set on the thermostat is reached.

If you observe closely, there isn’t much difference between a refrigerator and an air conditioner except for the insulated box, which is missing in the air conditioner. In this case, the room becomes the box and is thus cooled. The evaporation of a refrigerant, like Freon, is used to provide the cooling. The term Freon is generally used for any of the various nonflammable fluorocarbons that are used as refrigerants and as propellants for aerosols.

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