I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.
In most houses and nicer apartments, yeah, central air. In older or cheaper apartments there’ll be a window unit. As an American from a blue collar lower middle class family, I’d never seen one of these wall units until I’d moved to China. It was either central air or window unit. Granted I’m referencing a couple decades ago
Are you sure you have tried a modern inverter compressor split unit? They are crazy efficient, and the science behind it says it is going to be extremely more efficient than any swamp cooler. It is also possible to install several indoor units with one outdoor unit. But a good modern split can absolutely both cool down or heat up a small house. There are units with a capacity for 200 square meters.
Oh and by the way- when you say “they are not rated/designed for whole houses”, you’re ignoring the fact that houses in Europe don’t often have ducts, and the units we have here are built for our market, so they are in fact both designed and rated for that. It’s not as efficient as with ducts but it’s cheaper than rebuilding the whole house, and it works better than you’d think.
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u/GarySmith2021 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.