Using air conditioning in your car?

What is the best way to keep cool in your car during the hot weather?

The most efficient way is to use the fans/vents without the air conditioning turned on. However, this will not always be sufficient as all it does is blow in the hot air from outside.

If travelling at low speeds, opening a window will allow a much larger air flow within the car, but the faster you go the greater the drag.

Using air conditioning should normally be avoided as it can reduce your fuel efficiency by up to 10%. However, at times it is almost a necessity to use, especially in very hot and sunny weather when the car has been sitting in the sun. At high speeds, it may also be more efficient to use the air conditioning than having the windows open. Please remember to switch the air-con off when no longer required. One thing that I would like car manufacturers to adopt is to have the air conditioning switched off by default every time that the engine is started, so that the driver has to physically switch the air-con on every time he/she wants to use it. How many people drive around all year with with the air-con permanently on, without thinking about it. always wasting fuel and increasing emissions? 

More driving tips can be found at on the Green Saving Expert website.  

This entry was posted on 02/07/2009 at 05:23 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.