What is solar air conditioning system?

Solar air conditioning system is any air conditioning powered by the sun's energy. Solar air conditioners have no emissions and supply their own energy, so customers can lessen their carbon footprint and reduce their energy costs at the same time.

Types of Solar Air Conditioning
The simplest form of solar air conditioning is a small solar panel that generates enough electricity to run a fan—for example, to cool an attic. More advanced and powerful systems use air conditioners that run just like any window air conditioner—by transferring heat from one place to another using refrigerants, coils, and a compressor.

What's different is the source of the energy that runs the air conditioner: either from water heated by the sun or from electricity generated from solar panels.

Solar PV Air Conditioners
A solar photovoltaic (PV) air conditioner uses standard PV panels to generate enough electricity during the day to run an air conditioner. The air conditioner units run on either direct current (DC) or alternating current (AC). Alternating current units require an inverter which takes the DC electricity that solar panels produce and converts it to the AC electricity that most homes run on.
Solar PV air conditioners don't need a connection to the electricity grid. Off-grid solar PV air conditioners are more likely to run on DC, since it's more efficient than converting the electricity to AC. With a battery charged by solar panels added to the system, a solar PV air conditioner can run at night. (Batteries store energy as DC, but with an inverter, a battery can be added to an AC system as well.)

A “hybrid” solar PV air conditioning system allows you to run the air conditioner off of your solar panels during the day but plug it into a normal household outlet to run it at night. Hybrid systems require a DC-to-AC inverter, and since they sometimes rely on grid electricity, they are responsible for the greenhouse gases emitted when that grid electricity was produced.