Energy recovery systems can be used in HVAC to reduce energy consumption by recovering wasted energy from the exhausted air to pre-cool inlet fresh air. In this paper, experimental study of utilizing cooling coil (CC) and cooling coil combined with heat exchanger (CCHE) has been developed. Considering the different climate zones in Iran, the experimental study has been done for the areas with high humidity content. In each case, the effects of air-to-air heat exchanger (HE) on the sensible and latent cooling load are investigated. The analysis gives the applicability of HE in Iran for various operational conditions to obtain air with lower moisture content. In CCHE systems more latent load quota is allocated in cooling coils and lower air humidity ratio can be obtained. Also in the cities with higher dew point depression (difference between dry-bulb and dew point temperature) more humidity reduction is achieved and the difference between latent load quotas of CCHE system is higher than CC system. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.