Ceiling fan
Meanwhile, electric ceiling fans became very popular in other countries, particularly those with hot climates, such as India and the Middle East, where a lack of infrastructure and/or financial resources made energy-hungry and complex freon-based air conditioning equipment impractical. In 1973, Texas entrepreneur H. W. (Hub) Markwardt began importing highly efficient ceiling fans to the United States that were manufactured in India by Crompton Greaves, Ltd. Crompton Greaves had been manufacturing ceiling fans since 1937 through a joint venture formed by Greaves Cotton of India and Crompton Parkinson of England, and had perfected the world's most energy efficient ceiling fans thanks to its patented 20 pole induction motor with a highly efficient heat-dissipating cast aluminum rotor. These Indian manufactured ceiling fans caught on slowly at first, but Markwardt's Encon Industries branded ceiling fans (which stood for ENergy CONservation) eventually found great success during the energy crisis of the late 1970s and early 1980s, since they consumed far less energy (under 70 watts of electricity) than the antiquated shaded pole motors used in most other American made fans. The fans became very effective energy saving appliances for residential and commercial use by supplementing expensive air conditioning with a cooling wind-chill effect. Fans used for comfort create a wind chill by increasing the heat transfer coefficient, but do not lower temperatures directly.
Due to this renewed commercial success using ceiling fans effectively as an energy conservation application, many American manufacturers also started to produce, or significantly increase production of, ceiling fans. In addition to the imported Encon ceiling fans, the Casablanca Fan Company was founded in 1974. Other American manufacturers of the time included the Hunter Fan Co. (which was then a division of Robbins & Myers, Inc), FASCO (F. A. Smith Co.), and Emerson Electric; which was often branded as Sears-Roebuck.
Hashem Akbari
The UHI group in LBNL have monitored buildings in the California central valley with lightly colored, more reflective roofs and found that these buildings used up to 40% less energy for cooling than buildings with darker roofs. In a study funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, they carried out a detailed analysis of energy-saving potential of light-colored roofs in 11 U.S. metropolitan areas, with resulting estimated savings potential of about $175 million per year (1998 USD) for the 11 cities. Extrapolated national energy savings from air conditioning was estimated at $750 (1998 USD) million per year. The savings from shade trees and vegetation is also estimated at $1B per year. The impacts of savings in health and lost work time owing to a projected 12% O3 reduction are three times larger than that cited for air conditioning above. Heat island mitigation technologies apply all around the world in both developed and developing countries. They estimate that the potential energy savings and health benefits from a worldwide implementation of heat-island mitigation technologies can save over $10B per year. They are working with manufacturers of roofing and paving materials to develop ‘colored’ solar-reflective materials for the marketplace, including both dark and light-colored cool shingles with reflectivity of up to 60%.