When my apartment AC stopped functioning, I thought I would be stuck with absolutely nothing for months on end waiting for the management company to get around to fixing it. I went through a few months with absolutely nothing because I couldn’t afford the portable AC options that most use in a window. While the portable unit I bought worked pretty well, I found out there are quite a few cheap small portable air conditioner options out there that may have worked better with a much lower electricity footprint.
Considering A Tiny AC Unit With No Outside Vent?
If an AC is marketed as personal, it probably isn’t an AC unit at all. There are a few models of air conditioner out there that are the real thing, but they aren’t known for being particularly useful. Generally, personal AC units have a BTU of about 1000 and only manage to cool a small area directly in front of the vent. Even then, the venting area behind the unit will usually mean making the space as hot as it is cool depending on where you are standing.
Are Swamp Coolers A Decent Alternative?
There is no reason to avoid evaporative cooling if you live in an extremely dry environment. Many people from hot and dry areas claim that swamp coolers work quite well for them, sometimes cooling the air by as much as thirty degrees. They also manage to cool a room for a much lower energy cost than traditional air conditioning, and they’re pretty cheap to pick up. If you live somewhere wet enough to have any amount of rain in the summer, evaporative cooling probably won’t work too well for you.
Actual window AC units are the best option if you can get one, and portable window vented units are definitely a good second choice. Unless you want to run around with one of those personal air conditioner neck options, you really don’t have too many good alternatives. I’ve had a portable window vented AC for several years at this point and nothing else comes close to cooling one room that well. They can get really expensive, though, in both initial cost and ongoing energy costs.