Dealing with the heat

[EBuff75]

This post probably would've been more useful a few months ago, but let's have it anyway.  It's been hot this summer and I can't wait for cooler, fall weather to arrive!  (I'm saying this as someone in the northern hemisphere - if you're down south, this may be relevant in a few months!) 

I'm fortunate to have central air conditioning at my house (and working A/C in my vehicle) so my usual way of dealing with the heat is to stay indoors as much as possible!  If I do have to go outside, doing work when it is cooler out (early morning usually) is the best for me.  

Other methods that I've employed:  fans (both plug-in and battery-operated), cooling neck towels, lightweight / loose clothing, and drinking lots of water (and sometimes Gatorade).  

Cool showers feel great, but they're apparently the wrong way to go about it if you want longer-term relief.  Supposedly, a hot shower helps to dilate the blood vessels in your skin, which helps the body to dump heat.  So while it may not be as comfortable up-front, it helps more later on.

How have you been dealing with the heat?  What tips do you have to share with the rest of the group?

[majorhavoc]

Going into work every day (as opposed to working from home, which is an option for me 2 days a week).  The office always has frosty a/c.  I like to take a 2.5 mile lunchtime walk on a wooded trail that runs right behind my place of employment.  It's a good 5 degrees cooler under the trees than out on the business's parking lot where most of the noontime walkers take their strolls.  But with temps in the mid to high 90's lately and high humidity, I'm temporarily walking through the floors of our 3-story parking garage.  The first floor is reasonably cool, the second floor a little less so and the third floor is - well let's just say if I spent all my time walking up there I would NOT be presentable afterwards in a professional office environment. 

My heat pump at home does a decent job of keeping the house cool, but it doesn't distribute that coolness very well - it's just one unit for the whole house (it's a very small house, but still).

I know that's not really the answer you're looking for.  All my preps are all predicated on scenarios that involve a grid-down situation. And my little 4000 watt portable generator will not run the heat pump.  It's a concern because the forecast is for a lot more 95+ days in the coming years and I'm starting to age into the part of the population that's more vulnerable to heat. 

I'd probably first see if there were any cooling centers still operating (yes, we have them in Maine).  Barring that, probably some/all of the ideas EBuff75 posted about.  Everything except for a battery powered fan, that is.  Currently I don't have one.  Thanks for making me realize that's a hole in my preps that I need to plug er, unplug.  I wish the Ryobi cordless fans were more reasonably priced because I'm awash in their 18volt battery packs.

That bit about hot vs cold showers is new information to me.  But it does make sense.

[EBuff75]

Where I live, we always schedule our own "National Night Out" and that's coming up this weekend (as opposed to the "official" one which was last week).  Our CERT decided (at my suggestion) to focus on extreme heat this year for our table.  To that end, we're going to hand out bottled water and neck cooling towels (which we were able to order for the extravagant price of $0.38 each!).  It's an inside / outside event and our table is outside (so that we can set up next to our trailer.  It's supposed to be 91F on Saturday, which means that our handout items will have actual value!

We looked at getting a bunch of miniature tubes of sunscreen as handouts, but they were a bit too expensive.

I'll bring along some fans (battery-powered, misting, and regular) as part of our demo and we're definitely going to set up our pop-up canopy to get some shade!

[Moab]

Well I've got you all trumped. I've been living in the Phillipines. Lmao! Previously I was up north. And the rainy season kept an afternoon storm coming in just about everyday. But instead of 96 it would drop down to 86. Or some such limited temp drop. Humidity staying at 100%+.

But further south on Bohol. Where I moved to and am returning to on the 29th. (Signed a lease on an apt) No such luck. I haven't looked into why the rainy season didn't seem to hit the same. But it was hot 24/7. And still is.

One positive is that my entire wardrobe and travel essentials easily fit into a backpack. T-shirts, shorts, socks and running shoes. A pair of sandals. That's it. Easy peasy. There is no such thing as a dress code. Even in a nice restaurant. Fashion no longer exists. Except in maybe the quality of your leather sandals VS a pair of Crocs. Both of which are perfectly acceptable. Although I save my Crocs for home.

AC is not something I can live without yet. But there was a curve where I went from 19c setting on the AC. To 26c. So I'm getting used to it. Eventually I will live in a very well ventilated house. And hopefully wean myself off of AC as much as possible.

Locals are in sweats and synthetic jackets on days like these. They swear it protects them from sun and heat. I will be shocked if I ever adjust that much. 

[MacWa77ace]

That's some serious humidity.

AC is not something I can live without yet. But there was a curve where I went from 19c setting on the AC. To 26c. So I'm getting used to it. Eventually I will live in a very well ventilated house. And hopefully wean myself off of AC as much as possible.

Man, 19c = 66F and I'd be wearing a jacket or hoodie and long pants. That's freezing and I'd have a $400+ electric bill in the summer if my A/C could even get the house down that low. I don't think it even could.

We keep ours at 77 [25c]

[Lambykins]

Currently, summer heat is the bane of my existence.
I wake up around 7 am, take my meds and try to go back to sleep (you'll see why in a minute)
Wake up again between 10 am and noon (if I'm lucky), try and eat something. Hydrate as much as I can.
During the day I take cool showers, graze on a little fresh fruit, sit in front of my fan and write or watch videos, sometimes take a cat nap.
After sundown...I take my nighttime meds, take another cool shower or two, clean up/do chores.
I try to go to sleep around 11pm to Midnight.
This does not work well.
I usually sleep only 30 minutes to an hour before I wake up with an asthma attack, or I am sweating so much that I end up trying to sleep in soggy sheets. If I am having asthma attacks I have to use my inhaler and that wakes me up. If I am sweating, I have to change my clothes, take a cool shower and sometimes change my sheets.
That's my whole night...a cat nap (more or less), then wake up with asthma attack or sweating til I'm soaked, try to mitigate whichever one it is (or sometimes both), try to get back to sleep...rinse and repeat. All night long.
 
In cool/cold temps (fall/winter), I snuggle down in bed around 8 to 8:30pm, sleep soundly until 6am, and get up feeling bright and chipper. I usually leave a window open (even in freezing temps) or at least a window cracked open. If my bedroom is 40f to 50f degrees (4 to 10 degrees celsius) I am comfortable. No asthma attacks, no pools of sweat.
Weird thing is, not one of my kids is like this. I have 7 kids, 3 despise cold weather, 1 doesn't care either way....he is fine in blistering heat or freezing cold... and the other 3 are what I call *temperate* people. They like moderate temperatures, not cold, not hot. 

[EBuff75]

Me:  Check it out - I have fans!  *rim shot*
Audience:  *silence*  *cough*  *more silence*

You cannot view this attachment.

Left to right:  Zippi, Koonie / ATEngeus, SkyGenius (oscillating), Ausic (misting fan), Amken (waist fan)

The Zippi was my desk fan when I was still working in an office (I work from home now).  It's very quiet and those are soft, polyester blades, so it's child / pet / forgetful adult safe!  I still use it in my home office, but now it's mainly to help redirect some of the air from the vent (which faces away from my desk).  It moves a surprising amount of air and so quiet that I've accidentally left it on overnight more times than I can count.  It's been in nearly continuous use now for about 9 years!

I had the Koonie version of the next fan, but it died after a few years and I replaced it with an identical one from ATEngeus.  There are probably dozens more of this same fan on Amazon, so when I needed a new one, I just picked whichever had the best sale price at the time.  This fan gets a TON of use, as it's my bedroom fan.  Not for the noise, as it's really quiet, but for a nice, gentle breeze at night, even with the window closed.  It's USB-C rechargeable, but doesn't have swappable batteries.  It's also very easy to bump the power button when you move it and you then have to scroll through all of the power levels to turn it back off (there are four power levels, plus a variable "breeze" option that ramps up and down randomly).  I just leave mine plugged in via USB, which it doesn't seem to mind at all.  The fan is a clip-on, so it can be moved around as needed.  On high, it moves quite a bit of air, but is obviously louder than the low setting, which is almost silent.

The SkyGenius is no longer available with the oscillating option (at least not from them - there may be copies available elsewhere), but does have the basic fan for sale still.  This was my first battery-operated fan and it's gotten a lot of use over the last 6 years.  It's a bit louder, the volume and pitch of which varies with fan speed, so you can sort of adjust to a speed that is less annoying sometimes.  I rarely use the oscillating function, but it works fine.  The fan is also a clip-on, which makes it useful if you need to place it somewhere odd.  Not as much air volume, given its size, but it can move a fairly good column of air when it's cranked up.  This is currently in my home office for times when it's a little too warm in here.

The Ausic misting fan was sort of an impulse purchase last year and has worked really well.  The top is a small water tank, which has to be filled fairly frequently, but it gives off a pretty good mist out of the front and really does help to cool you down in hot weather.  We've used it at our CERT tent, where it was greatly appreciated, and one of my coworkers commandeered it during a team picnic recently!  It is battery-powered and lasts quite a few hours for the fan.  Using the sprayer will cut the run-time down to maybe 3-4 hours, but it will run while plugged in via USB.  There is also a light, if you wanted to use it while camping.  It's not very bright, but it is there.

Finally, my most recent purchase was a waist fan.  This clips onto your belt, with another clip on the outer side to clip to your shirt, allowing the fan to blow air up your shirt.  It works fairly well, but is also fairly loud as you turn it up due to the tiny fan inside and the large amount of air that it moves.  Battery life seems pretty good, but I haven't really tested it much yet, as I've only had it a couple of days.  There is also a flashlight and a red/blue flashing light for visibility. 

So there are some different fans.  I didn't include my big utility fan (for drying out wet areas or for ventilation during home improvement projects), or just plain-old desk / floor fans, or ceiling fans.  Just a couple that I have that are a bit different and that some people might not have seen before. 

[eugenenine]

We grew up without AC. So one of the things was careful opening and closing of windows and curtains. If its hotter outside than inside then close the windows and close the curtains to block the sunlight.
You would be surprised how many people don't know this. We were having a tupperware party shortly after getting married and as soon as MIL arrived and was offended that the curtains were closed so "it looks like a dungeon in here" and yanked them open so hard she broke the curtain rod and then the house got how.
You also have to start doing activities when its hot, some kind of outdoor exercise starting in the spring so you work up a tolerance to the heat. I may sweat a lot but I can go do things outside in the heat because I've built up some tolerance to it.

[MacWa77ace]

You also have to start doing activities when its hot, some kind of outdoor exercise starting in the spring so you work up a tolerance to the heat. I may sweat a lot but I can go do things outside in the heat because I've built up some tolerance to it.

[EBuff75]

We grew up without AC. So one of the things was careful opening and closing of windows and curtains. If its hotter outside than inside then close the windows and close the curtains to block the sunlight.

You reminded me of something that a number of houses around here have from before A/C was as common - a whole house fan.  At night, when it cools off outside, you open the windows on your house and turn on the fan.  It pushes the hot air out of the house, drawing in cooler air through the windows.  

They're loud as all get-out when running (at least in my experience), but they help a lot!

[Moab]

That's some serious humidity.

AC is not something I can live without yet. But there was a curve where I went from 19c setting on the AC. To 26c. So I'm getting used to it. Eventually I will live in a very well ventilated house. And hopefully wean myself off of AC as much as possible.

Man, 19c = 66F and I'd be wearing a jacket or hoodie and long pants. That's freezing and I'd have a $400+ electric bill in the summer if my A/C could even get the house down that low. I don't think it even could.

We keep ours at 77 [25c]

It was a rooftop condo/apt. So the direct sunlight hit the metal roof directly. I doubt it was 66f inside the apt. But the AC had to stay at 66f or it wouldn't keep it cool. Third world AC.  

[EBuff75]

It was a rooftop condo/apt. So the direct sunlight hit the metal roof directly. I doubt it was 66f inside the apt. But the AC had to stay at 66f or it wouldn't keep it cool. Third world AC.

Not just third world AC.

I had a pretty nice apartment here in Michigan that had it's own central AC unit that was like that.  The apartment faced west and if the AC wasn't running flat out all day, it would be over 100F when I got home.  Even with the central air unit going, it could only cool down to around 80F in the summer.  Maintenance deemed that the unit was working fine and that no repair was needed, despite me having electric bills (for an apartment) that frequently hit $250/month because it had to run so much!! (and that was back in 2004)

[MacWa77ace]

That's some serious humidity.

AC is not something I can live without yet. But there was a curve where I went from 19c setting on the AC. To 26c. So I'm getting used to it. Eventually I will live in a very well ventilated house. And hopefully wean myself off of AC as much as possible.

Man, 19c = 66F and I'd be wearing a jacket or hoodie and long pants. That's freezing and I'd have a $400+ electric bill in the summer if my A/C could even get the house down that low. I don't think it even could.

We keep ours at 77 [25c]

It was a rooftop condo/apt. So the direct sunlight hit the metal roof directly. I doubt it was 66f inside the apt. But the AC had to stay at 66f or it wouldn't keep it cool. Third world AC.

Oh, ok. Yeah that's why I said earlier I didn't think my A/C could even get the house down to 66.

I understand; I lived in an apartment in a complex that had a bunch of different sized apt units. Mine had the most sq ft and the most volume because we also had an inside stairwell and a vaulted ceiling. Every A/C unit in the complex was the same size  unit, a one ton. It wasn't big enough for my unit so even though we set the thermostat at 75, in the summer at about 10am the A/C would cycle on and not turn off again until 10pm [I timed it] and all the while the temp would creep up during the day to about a max of 81 degrees at about 4 or 5pm and then start slowly moving back down until at about 10pm it'd hit 75 again and turn off. My electric bill in that apartment was/is about the same as the one I get now in the summer 20 years later, with a house that's twice as big and runs a sprinkler pump 6 hours a week and a pool pump 42 hours a week.   

[EBuff75]

Our National Night Out event is this afternoon (yeah, I know).  Right now it's 83F and 59% humidity, but it'll be up around 92F and probably about 50% humidity by the time it wraps up at 3pm.  I'm already drenched in sweat, just from making a few trips from house to garage while loading the truck.  

Our topic is dealing with extreme heat and we'll be handing out water and neck cooling towels.  I'm even bringing along a bowl so that any dogs can have a drink too.  Our "booth" is outside, so no a/c for us.    We will have a canopy and I'm bringing several fans (as part of the demo), but it's still going to suck...

[EBuff75]

It was hot at the NNO event.  However CERT handled it by going over-the-top!   

Not just one or two fans - how about six!  All four of the battery-operated ones I reviewed above (including the belt fan), plus two utility fans! 

That's not enough you say?  Got you covered!  Using both my Pecron E1500LFP and my Bluetti E200V2 (because we ran through both of them during the 3 hour event), we ran a portable a/c unit - outdoors!     Yeah!  To heck with all the dads out there who complain about leaving the door open!  We were literally air conditioning the outdoors!  (not very well, but it was nice to stand/sit right in front of it)

I did run the belt fan the whole time and ran into someone else who had one as well.  Plus there were several people who already knew about them. For those who hadn't seen one before, there were several who expressed interest and said they might look one up to purchase.

We handed out neck cooling towels and bottles of water at our table.  Those were very popular and several people (including some young kids) knew about the neck towels from playing little league or being in a marching band.  The Boy Scouts were set up on the other side of the field and when the event was wrapping up, probably half of them came by to get a towel.  Since we had a bucket of ice/water to cool the bottled water, it made a convenient place to dunk the towels to get them wet.  

I also did my walk-through of the indoors portion of the event.  In past years I've usually done this while holding a floor lamp that's running off a battery, but today I carried the misting fan and wandered through, using it on people as I went.  I think that there may be a local surge in purchases of those off of Amazon now, as people really liked it!  Again, I did run into a few people who have one and everyone agreed that they work very well in hot weather.  

Between the belt fan, neck cooling towel (which I also wore the whole time), three bottles of water and one Gatorade, staying in the shade (we set up two pop-ups in addition to our trailer), and sitting in front of fans / air-conditioner, we made it through!  It was still really hot and now that I've unloaded (and plugged everything in to charge back up) it's time for a shower.  I feel disgusting right now!

[MacWa77ace]

That's some serious humidity.

AC is not something I can live without yet. But there was a curve where I went from 19c setting on the AC. To 26c. So I'm getting used to it. Eventually I will live in a very well ventilated house. And hopefully wean myself off of AC as much as possible.

Man, 19c = 66F and I'd be wearing a jacket or hoodie and long pants. That's freezing and I'd have a $400+ electric bill in the summer if my A/C could even get the house down that low. I don't think it even could.

We keep ours at 77 [25c]

I was visiting in-laws this last weekend in Central Florida. I was freezing. They keep their A/C on 72 degrees.

Back in my A/O now; and today it was a balmy 83 degrees when I walked out to my car to go to work, and really low humidity. Usually its high humidity and feels hot in the mornings. Today felt really nice. 

[Crimson_Phoenix]

As someone who has only ever lived in the Desert Southwest and hurricane country on the Gulf Coast, what are some backup solutions for heat management should prolonged power loss be a thing? I still have a 500WH Rockpals power bank and 100W panel to trickle charge I can probably run an LED lamp and box fan on for a few hours if I keep myself to one room. Is a portable evaporative cooler or AC unit worth having?

[EBuff75]

As someone who has only ever lived in the Desert Southwest and hurricane country on the Gulf Coast, what are some backup solutions for heat management should prolonged power loss be a thing? I still have a 500WH Rockpals power bank and 100W panel to trickle charge I can probably run an LED lamp and box fan on for a few hours if I keep myself to one room. Is a portable evaporative cooler or AC unit worth having?

Portable AC would probably be a no-go, just because of the amount of energy needed.  It would drain that Rockpals power station very quickly (in my post above, I fully drained a 1500Wh power station and almost drained a 2000Wh power station during a 3hr event where we were using it as a demo).

Evaporative (aka swamp cooler) would be better, if you're in a climate where it would be worth it.  Generally, those are going to do best in low humidity environments.  And since they're basically a fan with some type of medium to blow air through and pick up water, it's really just a fancy fan!  Thus, the power requirements are lower. That said, you'll still probably drain your power station in fairly quick order (I looked up a swamp cooler on Home Depot and it draws 120w).  

Heating and cooling are generally the biggest power draws for a house (even more so if you consider that cooking is just another form of heating), which is why they're so hard to keep going when the power is out.  

[Raptor]

As someone who has only ever lived in the Desert Southwest and hurricane country on the Gulf Coast, what are some backup solutions for heat management should prolonged power loss be a thing? I still have a 500WH Rockpals power bank and 100W panel to trickle charge I can probably run an LED lamp and box fan on for a few hours if I keep myself to one room. Is a portable evaporative cooler or AC unit worth having?

In 2021 after Hurricane Ida a friend of mine was without power for well over 10 days. I loaned him a small 1600 watt continuous power generator. In a 24-hour period it burned 5 gallons of gasoline. 

He used that generator to run his refrigerator and a 5000 BTU window unit that kept his bedroom and bathroom air condition. The generator did not have the capacity to run both the refrigerator and the window unit simultaneously. But a slightly larger generator say one that's applied 2,000 Watts continuously could have done that.
He may do by running the refrigerator about 8 hours a day to keep it cool and then spending the rest of the time running the window unit to keep his bedroom and bathroom as a cooling area. What he would do is simply alternate and then at night run only the air conditioner.

Granted it did require 5 gallons of gasoline a day so obviously long-term in a real in a real disaster where fuel is not available this is not a long term grid gone solution.

That said it does tell me that if you have the ability to produce about 1.6kw of power you can provide relief from the heat..

[Crimson_Phoenix]

As someone who has only ever lived in the Desert Southwest and hurricane country on the Gulf Coast, what are some backup solutions for heat management should prolonged power loss be a thing? I still have a 500WH Rockpals power bank and 100W panel to trickle charge I can probably run an LED lamp and box fan on for a few hours if I keep myself to one room. Is a portable evaporative cooler or AC unit worth having?

Portable AC would probably be a no-go, just because of the amount of energy needed.  It would drain that Rockpals power station very quickly (in my post above, I fully drained a 1500Wh power station and almost drained a 2000Wh power station during a 3hr event where we were using it as a demo).

Evaporative (aka swamp cooler) would be better, if you're in a climate where it would be worth it.  Generally, those are going to do best in low humidity environments.  And since they're basically a fan with some type of medium to blow air through and pick up water, it's really just a fancy fan!  Thus, the power requirements are lower. That said, you'll still probably drain your power station in fairly quick order (I looked up a swamp cooler on Home Depot and it draws 120w). 

Heating and cooling are generally the biggest power draws for a house (even more so if you consider that cooking is just another form of heating), which is why they're so hard to keep going when the power is out. 

I moved back to the Arid Zone four years ago and this was the environment swamp coolers were built for. It's all Dad's family had until the 70s, when his parents started getting older.