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Should you use fans or air conditioning to cool an office?

It’s the same age-old question that business owners ask themselves every year. When the heat rolls in, is it better to have fans or air conditioning to cool an office? For some, the answer’s obvious. Fans are by far the cheaper option. But the question is – does that automatically make them the best? Read on to find out!

Are fans really the best choice?

It’s safe to say that when an office first starts to get unbearably stuffy, fans are the first port of call for many business owners. That’s hardly surprising, in many ways. Fans are cheap to buy and famously cheap to run, and they’re a great quick fix for those particularly hot summer days we get here in the UK. The trouble is, when temperatures start getting consistently hot – say, in the middle of a heatwave – fans quickly start to show their limits.

Here’s the big issue. Ultimately, fans are just blowing hot air around the room. This isn’t great for cooling an office in the same way that opening a window isn’t doing much to cool you either. Just moving the air around doesn’t really cool it, which is why you can only properly feel the benefit of a fan when it’s more or less blowing air directly into your face from a few feet away. That presents its own problems in an office environment, as it can potentially send paperwork flying in every direction.

Then there’s the fact that the smaller fans don’t tend to be terribly effective, whereas the larger ones are loud, clunky, and often in the way. Now, it’s true that when it comes right down to it, they are cheaper to run. But the question you need to ask yourself is – are they so effective at the job that it’s worth all the other hassle that you have to deal with?

busy office

All the cool crowd love air conditioning

If you’ll pardon the pun – we’re big fans of air conditioning. The reason why it’s so much more effective is simple, really. Essentially, an air conditioning system cools indoor spaces like offices by actually changing the temperature of the air, not just blowing it around. In fact, for larger spaces like offices, it’s more or less the only realistic option. Most open plan offices would require at least two or three fans circulating air from different directions. Unfortunately, this also multiplies the noise factor, as well as the hassle of pinning down paperwork.

On the other hand, air conditioning is a compact, quiet and effective way to cool large spaces. This is especially true for offices, given all the warm bodies and active machinery. We’ve talked before about the sort of effect that temperature can have on productivity, so if you want to get the best out of your employees (while keeping them comfortable and happy, of course) then air conditioning is the best option by far!

And here at Askews, we’re the perfect people to help you out with that. Each of our heating and cooling engineers has a wealth of experience behind them in installing and maintaining air conditioning systems – there’s no better sort of people to help you through this summer heatwave! Click here for a free quote, or just give us a call on 01282 863 825.

 

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