Cool: Yonsei profs’ new radical air con

Park Young-woo, left, and Nham Kyun, right, professors at Yonsei University, and Jang Hyun-ik, Cecil president, pose by the new air-conditioner yesterday. [YONHAP]

Two professors at Yonsei University’s Wonju campus and Cecil, a maker of hotel amenity goods, announced that they developed an air-conditioner that does not use refrigerants or have an external unit.
Yesterday at the school’s main campus in Seoul, Yonsei professors Nahm Kyun and Park Young-woo held a demonstration for the press and major appliance makers. Nahm is a physics professor at the College of Science and Technology and Park Young-woo is a basic science professor at the Wonju College of Medicine.
The air-conditioner is mainly composed of a thermo-module and a self-developed “green kit.” When electricity flows through the thermo-module, a type of semiconductor, one side cools and the other side heats.
The “green kit” is a device that rapidly cools hot air that passes through without using a refrigerant, but the researchers declined to provide details. Conventional air- conditioners use a refrigerant to cool hot air, and release the heat from the vaporization into the air through an external unit. The team spent four years developing the product, which can be used as a heater in winter.
Cecil President Jang Hyun-ik said it will be commercially available as soon as they decide on the design.

By Han Eun-hwa JoongAng Ilbo [wohn@joongang.co.kr]