Warehouse & godown cooling
Warehouse and godown cooling that works with the doors open
Racked storage, loading bays, packing floors and agro sheds. Evaporative cooling thrives on the constant fresh-air exchange a working warehouse has anyway — and cools an enormous volume at a running cost air conditioning cannot approach.
The cooling problem here
Why this space is hard to cool
Racked to the roof
Every wall is stacked with goods, so there is often nowhere at floor level to mount a unit and no clear path for air across the floor. The only route in for cooled air is frequently overhead.
Big doors, constant movement
Loading doors open and close all day, so a sealed, chilled space is impossible to hold. Cooling that works with the fresh-air exchange, rather than fighting it, is the only thing that copes.
Stored goods and the people picking them
Some stock needs air movement and steady humidity rather than dry, cold air. And the pickers and packers working the aisles need a comfortable, ventilated space, not a stifling one.
How we solve it
What Dr. Duct puts in
- Overhead or ducted delivery. Where the walls are full, roof-mounted Air-X units with bottom discharge, or ducted Blow-X supply, put cooled air down into the aisles from above.
- Cooling that likes the open doors. Evaporative cooling replaces air rather than recirculating it, so the constant exchange through loading doors helps it rather than defeating it.
- Humidity and movement for the stock. Air movement and moderate humidity suit many stored goods and agricultural produce far better than dry refrigerated air.
- Low running cost over a huge volume. A godown is mostly empty air. Cooling it evaporatively costs a fraction of the tonnage of air conditioning the same cubic volume would demand.
The series that suits it
“Air-X ON, Garmi Gone”
Most godowns take roof or high wall-mounted Air-X units delivering air down into the aisles. Where the racking blocks every floor path, ducted Blow-X supply from an outside machine gets the air in overhead instead.
Before you decide
Questions people in this trade ask
How do you cool a warehouse that is racked to the ceiling?
From above. When the walls are stacked and the floor is full there is no room for floor-standing units and no clear path for air across the space, so we mount Air-X units on the roof with bottom discharge, or run ducted Blow-X supply, to push cooled air straight down into the aisles. The layout is worked out at the survey around your racking, not around where a unit would be easiest to fit.
The loading doors are open all day. Is that a problem?
The opposite — it helps. Evaporative cooling works by bringing in fresh outside air and letting the old air out, so the exchange through open doors is exactly the air movement it needs. This is precisely the situation where air conditioning fails: it cannot hold a chilled, sealed space when the doors keep opening, whereas fresh-air cooling simply keeps replacing the air.
Will the humidity damage stored goods?
It depends on the goods. Evaporative cooling adds moisture, which suits agricultural produce, grain, plants and many packaged goods — the added humidity and air movement help them. It does not suit anything that must be kept dry or cold, such as electronics, certain pharmaceuticals or a cold-chain store: those need refrigerated, dehumidified air. Tell us what you store and we will say plainly whether it fits.
Is it worth cooling a warehouse at all, or just the office?
That is a fair question and the answer is usually about the people. If pickers, packers and forklift drivers are working long summer shifts, cooling the working aisles pays for itself in comfort and productivity — and because the running cost over that volume is low, it is affordable in a way air conditioning never is. If the space is only lightly staffed, spot cooling the packing and dispatch area alone is often the sensible call.
How much air does a godown need?
Warehouses and halls are designed at around 16.7 CMH per sq.ft for general storage, more if there is heat or heavy activity. A 20,000 sq.ft godown at that rate needs about 3,34,000 CMH — roughly seven AirX 50K units, or a ducted arrangement if the racking blocks a floor path. Put your floor area into the calculator for a starting figure and we confirm it against the racking layout on site.
Tell us the size of your floor. We will tell you what it costs to cool it.
Free site survey, a heat-load calculation and a written quotation — no obligation. Most quotations go out within one working day.