- #26
StoneTemplePython
Science Advisor
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Shouldn't there be a real simple back of the envelope physics / chemistry type of estimate you can do to avoid having erroneous inferences like this?(amazing demonstration)
Has anyone heard of or used these non-battery, non-cord, and "all natural" dehumidifiers? These are cheap, mini dehumidifiers that work naturally. No electricity needed until you fill up the beads. Then you have to plug it in for natural air re-release. But it can be used over and over again the same way without running on electricity and can last up to 10 years.
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000H0XFCS/?tag=pfamazon01-20
The company is Eva Dry. Pretty good reviews.
I could see this being a good investment over a $200 dehumidifier. These are only $15. Granted, I might need to buy 5 of them or so, but they are an interesting alternative! No need to throw away the waste into a landfill either. It's all renewable technology.
I liked @Rive's counterpoint, but I also think we're supposed to teach one how to fish, more than give away fish here...
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a sketch:
pick a rough temperature estimate for your apartment / house. Figure out difference between 'typical' relative humidity and target of 50% of so. Then estimate how many buckets of water would need to be removed each day. It's at least one in my experience in a small apartment. This bucket size is much bigger than the eva dry items. The difference in scale should jump off the page, and tell out at you that the idea can't work.
(Technical Notes: You should be able to do the back of the envelope calculation and estimate this yourself for your circumstances. It gets complicated slightly in that you need to estimate the amount of 'leakage' / 'infiltration' of outside air with moisture into your place. I suppose you could set that up as a differential equation.
A much easier approach is to make use of prior information: a lot of people in a lot of different locations and circumstances have faced this before -- just Google the amount of buckets of water removed in typical apartment of size __ with temp and relative humidity of __ when using a proper dehumidifier...)
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I also can't imagine putting them in a bathroom... bathrooms have excess moisture by design, due to toilet and shower. By law in CA, I think all full bathrooms have a window or vent (for a reason). Opening a window and putting a box fan in it, will do wonders.I was partially thinking the Eva Dry minis might be too small after I posted that message. But, I can see them having some usefulness too, in combination with a compressor dehumidifier. I might look into buying both. Having the Eva Dry mini can be helpful for an isolated "trouble spot" like a bathroom. A regular $200 70-pint type of dehumidifier would be weird to place in a bathroom or even near it. You could also use the mini in a car, an attic, etc. I'm thinking.
***NOTE*** I saw online that silica gel is cancer-causing and there was a warning (thanks to California's Prop 65) on some Eva Dry products (not all) for cancer risks.
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All of that is very straightforward stuff that you should pick up from a little thinking and a mild STEM background.
A much harder / more subtle problem, is the cancer risk. I don't know about silica gel in particular, but there's a lot of nonsense that gets tagged as a cancer risk due to prop 65, combined with the innumeracy of judges and activists.
Here's a recent, relevant, and extremely thoughtful piece on the matter (topic: Starbucks coffee and cancer) from Bayesian knight, sir David Spiegelhalter:
https://medium.com/wintoncentre/coffee-and-cancer-what-starbucks-might-have-argued-2f20aa4a9fed
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