Human Refrigerator... Japanese Innovation to Combat the Heat

After feeling dizzy and exhausted from cycling to work under Japan’s harsh summer heat, warehouse worker Isao Tabuchi turned to his company’s latest offering: a human-sized refrigerator.

The device, roughly the size of a telephone booth, blasts users with refreshing cold air. Although it was launched only this year, it has seen strong demand in a country where temperatures continue to rise.

“I felt a great sense of refreshment thanks to the device. As soon as you use it, you feel an intensely cool breeze,” Tabuchi, 51, told AFP in the industrial city of Higashi-Osaka in western Japan.

After manually moving heavy boxes of tools and metal parts between loading docks, he walks calmly toward the unit, steps inside, sits down with a smile, and runs his fingers through his hair as if taking a shower.

“I stayed in it for only about two minutes, but even that short time was enough to stop sweating,” he told AFP.

Trusco Nakayama, a Tokyo-based distributor of industrial equipment, announced that it had sold more than 300 units of the “Dohimmon Box” since April, at a price of 1.5 million yen ($9,400).

Chiyoko Yamamoto, the company’s sales agent, told AFP that the device is “large, expensive, and not something you can simply explain with words to convince customers to say, ‘Okay, let’s buy one.’ So there were many doubts.”

The device operates on a standard electrical outlet and can be easily moved. To prevent overuse, it automatically shuts off after 20 minutes of operation.