I have often joked that in 50 thousand years climate scientists will discover that air conditioning caused global warming, since air conditioners create more heat than they do cold during operation. The joke goes, that as things got hotter, people turned up their air conditioning, releasing more heat and causing people to turn up their air conditioners even more. A vicious circle!This article by Michael Sivak in American Scientist explores the real downside of our obsession with personal climate control: the possibility of exceeding global energy supply.
Some sobering facts...
The United States currently uses more energy for air- conditioning than all other countries combined.
87% of American households are equipped with air-conditioning, and the United States expends about 185 billion kilowatt hours of energy annually on residential cooling.
Eight countries have the potential to exceed the United States’ air-conditioning usage, because of their warm climates and significant populations. India, China, and Indonesia could surpass the United States by substantial amounts: by factors of 14, 5.2, and 3.1, respectively, if they adopt American standards of cooling.
It begs the questions: where will we get the energy to fuel this expansion of air conditioning and how will we be able to deal with the resulting net heat gain?
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