3 ms·

Battery powered climate jackets? Exists but should be more ubiquitous

reaperman 3y ago
In both Texas and Louisiana I've seen two solutions to extend the working periods in between rests. But on the hottest days, no one should be working more than 15 minutes at a time outdoors. This isn't unreasonable -- we stop work for lightning storms as well and no one thinks that's an undue burden on business. Those two solutions are: - Low humidity days: Hyper-adsorbent textiles that you "fill up" with water and they evaporate over time, lowering the apparent temperature. - High humidity days: Two enormous chest freezers full of special phase-change "ice" packs. Due to some inherent properties of the universe (thermodynamics) it's best if the phase change happens around 50-60 degrees F or so, instead of at freezing. So it's not pure water. One chest freezer is for "frozen" packs. Workers take the packs from these and load them into pockets in special vests. Then after 30 minutes or so you remove them and put them in the other chest for "used" packs and reload yours with fresh ones. Then after lunch break the used packs from the morning should be frozen again. These techniques increase the amount of time someone can safely work outside by about 15 minutes per hour. Chemical plants in Louisiana are generally quite good at limiting the time that contractors and direct employees spend working outside on hot days. If the limit for today's temperature is "45 minutes per hour", then ice packs can extend that to continuous work. If the limit is "15 minutes per hour" then with ice packs workers could work 30 minutes per hour, but would have to be indoors in A/C for the other 30 minutes. Working 15 minutes every hour is very inefficient, but it's moral, humane, and in the long run calculated to be cheaper than the lost time of large teams being derailed by depositions in a wrongful death lawsuit and less productive teams for months until that's all resolved. Often instead of having workers work 15 minutes per hour, we'd just reschedule them for 1-2 weeks later when it's a bit cooler again.
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
  > we'd just reschedule them for 1-2 weeks later when it's a bit cooler again That makes a lot of sense. My wife used to work for a lawn service company and when it was predicted to be above a certain temperature, they'd just start a couple hours earlier in the day to avoid most of the heat.

In both Texas and Louisiana I've seen two solutions to extend the working periods in between rests. But on the hottest days, no one should be working more than 15 minutes at a time outdoors. This isn't unreasonable -- we stop work for lightning storms as well and no one thinks that's an undue burden on business. Those two solutions are: - Low humidity days: Hyper-adsorbent textiles that you "fill up" with water and they evaporate over time, lowering the apparent temperature. - High humidity days: Two enormous chest freezers full of special phase-change "ice" packs. Due to some inherent properties of the universe (thermodynamics) it's best if the phase change happens around 50-60 degrees F or so, instead of at freezing. So it's not pure water. One chest freezer is for "frozen" packs. Workers take the packs from these and load them into pockets in special vests. Then after 30 minutes or so you remove them and put them in the other chest for "used" packs and reload yours with fresh ones. Then after lunch break the used packs from the morning should be frozen again. These techniques increase the amount of time someone can safely work outside by about 15 minutes per hour. Chemical plants in Louisiana are generally quite good at limiting the time that contractors and direct employees spend working outside on hot days. If the limit for today's temperature is "45 minutes per hour", then ice packs can extend that to continuous work. If the limit is "15 minutes per hour" then with ice packs workers could work 30 minutes per hour, but would have to be indoors in A/C for the other 30 minutes. Working 15 minutes every hour is very inefficient, but it's moral, humane, and in the long run calculated to be cheaper than the lost time of large teams being derailed by depositions in a wrongful death lawsuit and less productive teams for months until that's all resolved. Often instead of having workers work 15 minutes per hour, we'd just reschedule them for 1-2 weeks later when it's a bit cooler again.

HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
> we'd just reschedule them for 1-2 weeks later when it's a bit cooler again That makes a lot of sense. My wife used to work for a lawn service company and when it was predicted to be above a certain temperature, they'd just start a couple hours earlier in the day to avoid most of the heat.