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A natural air conditioner lowers the temperature and energy costs too!

In May 2016, in Phalodi, a city in the Indian state of Rajasthan, the highest ever temperature in the land of Gandhi was recorded - 51°C, a sixty-year record. Meanwhile, 700 km away, the design and architecture firm Ant Studio was working in New Delhi with capacitor manufacturer Deki Electronics on a new product: a zero-energy natural air conditioner capable of dramatically lowering the temperature.

CoolAnt - as this air conditioner has been named - consists of terracotta cylinders stacked on top of one another and housed in a circular, stainless steel structure. A trickle of water runs through each of the pores of this giant clay hive – as it comes into contact with the surrounding hot air, it evaporates and pushes down the temperature by 6 to 14°C. An ancestral "technology", it was originally invented by the Egyptians to cope with the heat on the banks of the Nile.

In addition to having a great look, CoolAnt has a number of other advantages too. It is less energy hungry and cheaper than the conventional air conditioners that most Indians can’t afford. And it can be used to improve employees’ working conditions, which are particularly difficult during the hot summer months.

Deki Electronics decided to support the Ant Studio project and installed the very first CoolAnt at its plant in Uttar Pradesh.

Against the backdrop of increasing pressure on natural resources and global warming, this new air conditioner is a promising innovation. It is incredibly simple to make and needs next to no energy to operate it.

CoolAnt needs filling with water only once or twice a day – and it can use recycled water. The Deki Electronics plant in Uttar Pradesh uses the water it recycles on site.