Does a ceiling fan cool the room Or does it just create the illusion of cooling by moving the air?

Answer 1

ceiling fans only push the air around them, they have no cooling fuctionality. Ceiling fans don't have any way of cooling the air they circulate, but that is also true of fans placed on work desks or floor stands. However the human body feels more comfortable if the skin feels cool, and fans help to do this by evaporating more moisture from the skin, due to the flow of air over it. However there are certain aspects that should be taken into consideration; 1-that energy transfer takes time, and when air moves it does not transfer its heat to the body because the time of transference decreases, for example if you holds a hot cup of tea you will get burned, but if you touched it quickly you won't be burned.

2-Also if the temperature is low and you are covered by a blanket you will the air inside that blanket and you will be warm, accordingly if there is a fan the air won't stay around your body to be warmed. 3-Finally when air circulates this will increase the amount of air inside the room thus more air will absorb more heat from your body(if the air's temperature is less than the body' temp) until the thermal equilibrium occures. If there is no one in the room to feel the moving air then there is no effect other than wasting electricity to run the fan. Window fans on exhaust or intake do have a cooling or warming effect depending on the outside air.