The portable air conditioner is an easy and simple alternative to air conditioning systems with an outdoor unit that requires a professional and more expensive installation. These are devices that emit cold air without installation, so if you want to cool a room not too big without doing work, a portable device can be a recommended option.
How a Portable Air Conditioner works?
Generally, there tends to be confusion between these two types of systems, both portable but that work in a very different way with different results. Condensate extraction tube of a portable air conditioner coming out a window.
In the case of portable air conditioners, they work in a more or less similar way to a heat pump only concentrating the indoor and outdoor unit in a single device, which makes them much less efficient. The portable equipment generally consists of a tube for the extraction of the excess hot air whose outlet must be placed outside in a window, preferably through a hole that isolates the entrance of the air. It also consists of an outlet for the condensates that are usually stored in an indoor tank, although they are sometimes evacuated by another pipe that must be directed towards a drain.
Portable air operation
The portable air conditioner takes the hot air from the room from the rear grille, cools it and pushes it towards the room. At the same time, the condensing indoor unit also takes the air from the rear grid, heats it and sends it to the street through a pipe connected to a window. This cycle is not very efficient because part of the air that the device has made the effort to cool, ends up on the street again.
Although less common, two-tube portable equipment is also sold, which is more efficient because it frees the refrigeration and condensation cycles so it does not need to extract air from the inside to the outside.
More functions besides cooling: Humidifier and purifier
There are multifunction portable air conditioners on the market, which not only cool the room but also humidify and purify the air by means of anti-bacteria filters, thus avoiding problems of dryness in the respiratory tract and even reducing the levels of allergens in the home.
There is also portable equipment that acts as dehumidifiers, very effective in places with excessive humidity in the environment, something harmful to health. A dehumidifier absorbs moisture through a heat pump and can also be effective to facilitate the drying of rooms affected by water leaks or floods.
Energy Efficiency in portable air conditioning
According to the The Comfy Buddy, all equipment that consumes energy must be accompanied by its corresponding energy label, which indicates the level of energy efficiency according to the EER or coefficient of cooling efficiency. Represents the energy performance of the air conditioner when it operates in cooling mode. In the case of portable air conditioning equipment, a device with efficiency a must exceeds 2.60 EER.
As we can see in the table, the range of refrigeration efficiency requirements to obtain a rating is lower in the case of portable airs, so we can assure that they will always be less efficient than a split air conditioning unit with indoor unit and Exterior.
