"Smart" Alloy Will Make Your Air Conditioner 175% More Efficient

Leaving your air conditioner on full blast all day might soon come with a little less guilt, thanks to an alloy developed by the University of Maryland. The "thermally elastic" material could allow air conditioners to run 175% more efficiently.

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Cool!

~Lordbob

Uuugh! huh. Very descriptive.

Of course more information is needed, but my initial thoughts would be this material could possibly have numerous advantages in different fields. Maybe that's just the scientist in me though.

Perhaps a pc case of the future with Dyson bladeless fans that won't clog up:)

clunkfish said:

Airbot said:

The "thermally elastic" material could allow air conditioners to run 175% more efficiently.

175% more efficient? So if an a/c unit is already, say, 20% efficient, what would the new improved model be?

1. (20+175)=195% efficient
or
2. (20+(20*1.75)=55% efficient

If the latter, I'd say that was a 35% increase in efficiency, not 175%; and if the former, then you are getting more energy out than you put in, and physicists don't like that.

Mind you, if it really does produce more energy than you put in, simultaneously sorting out global warming and the energy crisis would suddenly be pretty straightforward. Just deploy a bunch of these air conditioners around the world and bob's yer uncle :)

No you are right in the second one. Assuming AC is about 40% efficient, then it is essentially (40+(40*.75) and becomes 70% efficient. It may not be a BIG increase, but if every AC unit in Arizona used this, we would save a ton of money and landfill space.

fseal said:

I was groaning about Lorbobs terrible terrible /terrible/ pun :)

That was literally unintentional and I didn't even think about it until you said this.

As Airbot said, this leaves room for some really (COOL) neat uses, such as a thermoelastic computer case, making the whole case a heatsink (not really practical, but kind of cool), or a better type of heatsink (more efficient than copper?).

~Lordbob

Lordbob75 said:

As Airbot said, this leaves room for some really (COOL) neat uses, such as a thermoelastic computer case, making the whole case a heatsink (not really practical, but kind of cool), or a better type of heatsink (more efficient than copper?).

I bypassed any thought of air conditioning efficiency and went straight to thinking about cooler components too :)

(pun or literal meaning are equally interchangeable )