Hi all,
My wife and I transplanted here last fall from AZ where every building has AC and we're trying to learn the best methods for keeping the place we're in cool without AC. The house was built in the early 1900s so the insulation situation is unknown but probably not good.
What we currently do: keep the house open with fans running until temps outside get to about 74 then close everything up to try and keep in the cool air from overnight/early morning and the sun and warm air out.
This works great when we have a warm day here and there, but while the ground floor stays comfortable, the upstairs gets pretty warm no matter what especially as we start to daisy chain 85°+ days.
My question is, once the upstairs temp starts to exceed outside temps, should we go ahead and open up the windows up there? Or keep everything up there closed and cooking until the temps outside start to get closer to that 74 mark?
Everything I've read just says to keep it closed, but it does seem to exceed outside temps on these 90° days.
This desert rat appreciates your pnw knowledge!
Quick edit since it keeps coming up, we aren't anti-AC and recognize that it is ultimately the best option. We're renting and working on outfitting important spaces with portable units/window units as we can. Just hoping to find best practices in the interim.