Cutting-edge technology can significantly reduce the amount of energy used for air conditioning

The AirJoule system consists of two chambers, each containing surfaces coated with this special material. They alternately dehydrated the airflow. One chamber is always drying the air that is being pushed through the system, while the other gradually releases the moisture it has previously collected. A tiny amount of heat from the drying chamber is transferred to the moisture-soaked coating in the other, because it helps encourage the water to drip off for removal. The two chambers switch roles about every 10 minutes, Jore says.

The process doesn’t frigid the air, but it does allow dehydrated air to be fed into a more customary air conditioning unit, drastically reducing the amount of energy used by that secondary unit. And Jore claims that AirJoule uses less than 100 watt-hours per liter of water vapor removed—potentially reducing the energy needed for dehumidification by up to 90 percent compared to a customary dehumidifier.

Montana Technologies wants to sell components of its AirJoule system to established HVAC companies rather than trying to build its own consumer products and compete with those companies head-on—an approach it calls AirJoule Inside. The company is also working on a system for the U.S. military based on the same technology that could collect drinking water from the air. Useful for soldiers stationed in the desert, one might imagine. But AirJoule is still in the prototype and testing stages.

“We’re building a few of these pre-production pilot units for potential customers and partners,” Jore says. “Think of the roofs of large retail stores.”

Competing company Blue Frontier has also developed a desiccant-based dehumidification system, although it uses a liquid desiccant, a salt solution, that can pull moisture from the air. CEO Daniel Betts says his company is installing the technology in a number of undisclosed locations around the U.S.—including offices, warehouses and restaurants. Three are already live, with six more scheduled to be installed by the end of the year.

Like AirJoule, Blue Frontier’s approach would combine with a separate, secondary air-conditioning process to frigid the dehumidified air. Blue Frontier also has to consider the need to regenerate its desiccant, although that process can be separated from dehumidification and run during periods when electricity demand is lower. “We’re shifting the air-conditioning load off the peak,” Betts says.

Really vast air conditioning systems work differently than a unit you might have in your home or apartment. Take, for example, centralized refrigeration plants in hotels. They distribute chilled liquid to guest rooms, where it is used to frigid the air. Refrigeration plants that lower the temperature of this liquid are already quite efficientBut they still have to draw power from the grid during peak hours, such as delayed afternoon, when everyone wants to frigid off from the heat of the day, notes Yaron Ben Nun, founder and chief technology officer of Nostromo Energy, which focuses on energy storage.

To get around this problem, Nostromo created a system called IceBrick, which was installed last year at two neighboring California hotels: the Beverly Hilton and the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills. The IceBrick, a rectangular module, sits on the building’s roof. It contains nearly 200 insulated water pods that can be frozen when off-peak power is available. Then, in the middle of a heated day, when hotel guests start sweating, the refrigeration plant can tap into that stored icy to avoid paying the highest electricity prices. That doesn’t reduce energy apply—in fact, it increases slightly—but Ben Nun says the system can reduce annual cooling costs by 30 percent and related emissions by up to 80 percent, because the IceBrick can wait to draw power during times when there’s a lot of renewable energy available on the grid (for example, when wind turbines are spinning strenuous in the middle of the night).