Hi. I had an argument with a friend about solar cooling.

I fully understand the physics of solar photovoltaics-- photon comes in,
electron gets pushed somewhere.  I fully understand the physics of heat pipes--
you can end up cooling something by having a phase-change object that gets to
move around inside a pipe.

I had an argument with someone who was apparently an insider in the industry
about passive solar cooling.  He couldn't describe it to me in a way that didn't
seem to be a gross violation of physics.  It sounded like a heat pipe, where you
heat up one end, but then because some heat is naturally flowing, extra heat
decides to come along for the ride.  That just didn't seem to float.   I did
some googling and the only thing I could find was the use of electric fans
powered by solar cells.

Any ideas what is physically going on here?

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