Does it make sense to install an air conditioner?

Hello,

we will soon build a city villa with 2 full floors in Brandenburg (Barnim).
Construction type: 2-layer masonry (lightweight expanded clay wall elements 15cm thick + 14cm mineral wool + 11cm clinker, so wall thickness: 40cm).
Now we have to decide whether we need an air conditioning system so that the house construction company can provide the appropriate openings and electrical installations. For us, only a split unit for one or two rooms is an option (kitchen, because it gets hot when cooking / living room or bedroom).

Unfortunately, we cannot assess whether it is really necessary, whether the rooms get hot during such hot days as the last 2 weeks or whether they remain cool due to the construction method of a single-family house.

Does anyone have experience?

We thank you for any advice.

Best regards

I have no idea how different temperatures affect your well-being. The purpose of the air conditioning is to increase comfort. I find air conditioners for cooling down the temperature in poorly insulated cars very pleasant. In the house, I prefer open windows and doors and gladly accept a few degrees higher temperature for that. In the southwestern USA, in poorly insulated houses, I was grateful for air conditioning during the summer months. In the Adobe house, you didn’t need one. Frequent switching between the air-conditioned and non-air-conditioned areas strains some people’s circulatory systems. Over several years, we hosted students from California or Texas for a few weeks in the summer. Some of them couldn’t handle our summer and the few air conditioners at all. There seem to be adaptation effects.

I would have them installed in the bedrooms; in the kitchen, it is in my opinion unnecessary.

We are also planning for the bedrooms in the new house. We are already living in KfW55 and no longer get the heat out of the walls in summer; after airing, it heats up again immediately.

We have implemented cooling via the geothermal heat pump in the underfloor heating. This is not an air conditioning system, as it only achieves about a 4-6°C difference. But it does so throughout the entire house. We are very happy with it.

My dad installed an air conditioner in the bedroom of his townhouse. It is located directly under the sloping roof. It works great - but I would catch a cold there quickly. That's why it was not an option for us.

Here the underfloor heating-cooling system did not work adequately, so after a year split units were installed in the house. (I would do it the same way again) I am now considering equipping the whole house with it. You don't have to cool it down to refrigerator temperatures, then there is no risk of catching a cold.