Automotive Seat Cooler Could Save Fuel

December 31, 2006 – Vol. 11 No. 41

AUTOMOTIVE SEAT COOLER COULD SAVE FUEL.

Cars and trucks are basically steel cans with glass windows that get hot as the dickens inside in blazing sunlight. Just like the greenhouse effect that warms the planet, sunlight heats the car’s interior but the glass won’t let the heat out. The highly heat-conductive steel body structure makes matters worse.

Because of their boiling interiors cars have really powerful air conditioners. Some say they’re as powerful as the ones that heat homes.

Powerful usually means energy consuming, fuel burning. As most drivers must notice there’s a significant drop-off in power when the air conditioning kicks in. That drop-off means drivers have to push the gas pedal a little harder to make up the difference in driving performance. Pushing on the pedal means more fuel consumed for the same work done. (At idle a car’s engine usually increases in revolutions automatically when the AC comes on.)

(You’d also think that automotive manufacturers would come up with a plan to ventilate car interiors when parked. Well, one did. Years ago Mazda offered a solar powered (Yes, solar powered.) ventilation fan that removed hot interior air when a car was sitting. The solar panel was part of the sunroof.)

A way to at least make drivers feel cooler - and thus cut down on the energy needed to run the air conditioner - would be to add ventilated seats. Apparently one Cadillac model is now offered with them.

According to the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in a study released in 2006, ventilated seats could save about 7 percent on national air conditioning fuel use - 522 million gallons of petrol each year in the US.

Well, now you can buy a ventilated seat pad from Nocord, an automotive accessories provider. The SummerSeat, as it is known, uses a 12-volt centrifugal fan to draw in air from holes in the seat bottom and back to help cool off the driver. The technology is similar to what NREL says will cut AC fuel consumption.

According to the Nocord, the plastic used in the seat cushion also helps to remove heat as air passes through it.

Energy consumption from air conditioning is even a bigger problem for hybrids, by the way. The power stored in the battery pack is precious stuff. It’s meant to be used to increase fuel efficiency, not to keep occupants comfy. Ventilated seats might actually increase fuel efficiency in hybrids and plug-in hybrids to a greater degree than conventional cars.

Visit Nocord at http://www.nocord.com/summerseatbl.html and W.E.T. Automotive Systems at http://www.wet.de/ for more advanced ventilated seat designs.