



Portable evaporative cooler downsides
1. Water
The number one maintenance that a portable evaporative cooler requires is filling it with water.
And of course the mess that comes along with filling it with water.
Some air coolers have removable basins that you can fill under a faucet similar to a humidifier, other types you have to externally fill the water by carrying the water to the machine.
And most modern air coolers have a compartment to put ice into them.(optional)
There are larger portable air coolers that have a garden hose hookup so that you do not have to continuously carry water to the machine.
2. Mold and bacteria
Related to the first required maintenance of filling the air cooler with water,
Is the necessity of dumping the water that is not used out of the air cooler when you are done.
Stagnant water can start growing bacteria and getting moldy in as little as 48 hours.
So it is a requirement to keep an air cooler clean and dry when it is not in use.
Turning on an air cooler that has germy stagnant water in it,
will distribute all the germs and bacteria in the water, into the air where you will breathe it.
Airborne mold can cause symptoms similar to the flu or pneumonia.
And there’s also a disease called legionnaires that originates from bacteria growing in water.
Nothing you want to mess around with.
3. Don’t cool very well in humid climates
Another issue with evaporative air coolers is that they use humidity as a source of cooling off the air.
But when the air is already humid, adding more humidity to the air makes the air feel hotter .
And that kind of makes using an evaporative cooler pretty much useless in the high humidity months or if you live in an area that has a higher year-round humidity.