Which direction should a ceiling fan turn during the summer to conserve energy?

Answer 1

Here is the usual advice. In summer you want to take th cooler air from down near the floor and bring it up to the ceiling where it is away from people. In the winter you want to take any heat that has collected up near the ceiling and bring it down to warm the people.

Depending on how the fan blades are set by the manufacturer the pushing down might be either clockwise or counter- clockwise. Turn it on and see if it blows down on you. If so that is the standard winter setup and you will know how to select a direction.

Some people don't follow that rule because they want to feel a breeze on themselves coming down in the summertime. They think that is more comfortable. If the fan is in an air-conditioned room that blowing down in summer also mixes the high warmer air with the low cooler air and keeps people from being too chilly.

You can choose either rule or ignore both and just go with how it happens to be set when you bought it.

Answer 2

I hate to disagree with the instructions of the previous answerer (nothing personal) but my understanding is exactly the opposite. The fan should push upward in the winter to drive warm air that is resting up in the top of the room (as warm air rises naturally, 'natch) out and down along the walls. That supposedly limits the feeling of cold from the windows. If you think about heat flow from an engineering standpoint, the flow is supposed to limit the amount of radiant heat that escapes through the windowpanes. Precisely how that works is lost in the mists of time when I took heat and mass transfer at university. In summer you set the fan to drive air downward onto the occupants of the room. The idea there is that airflow aides in evaporation. Evaporation is the change of state from a liquid (your sweat) to a gas (water vapor/steam). That process uses heat, therefore when you sweat and air blows across you, heat is drawn away in the process and you feel cooler. Probably entirely too much information expressed in too awkward a manner, but I hope this helps,
take care,

Answer 3

I don't think the direction of rotation makes any difference with respect to conserving energy, however, my fan came with instructions that said to rotate the fan so it pulls the air up in the summer and blows down in the winter. I tried it and don't particularly care for the up mode, so never use that.

Answer 4

Clockwise in the summer months,to blow down cool air.COUNTER CLOCKWISE in the winter months,for heat rises it make your place warm and toasty feeling.In the summer months open only windows with a protective screen on them.In the winter months just about everything should be hibernating.