Dry regions such as western Asia, north Africa, Australia and the southwestern United States are ideal for PDRC application due to the relative lack of humidity and cloud cover in both winter and summer. The cooling potential for desert regions has been estimated at "in the higher range of 80–110 W/m2," as per Aili et al. and 120 W/m2 as per Yin et al. The Sahara Desert and western Asia is the largest area on Earth with a high cooling potential in both winter and summer.
The cooling potential of desert regions risks being relatively unfulfilled due to very low population densities, which may lower interest in applying PDRCs for local cooling. However, in the event of global implementation, lowly populated or unpopulated desert climates may be an important "land surface contribution to the planetary albedo" which could "reduce air temperature near the surface, if not the whole atmosphere."