For all the bitching and moaning at the NY Times, I triple dog dare them to give up their own air conditioning…..yeah, I know, good luck with that!
THE blackouts that left hundreds of millions of Indians sweltering in the dark last month underscored the status of air-conditioning as one of the world’s most vexing environmental quandaries.
Fact 1: Nearly all of the world’s booming cities are in the tropics and will be home to an estimated one billion new consumers by 2025. As temperatures rise, they — and we — will use more air-conditioning.
Fact 2: Air-conditioners draw copious electricity, and deliver a double whammy in terms of climate change, since both the electricity they use and the coolants they contain result in planet-warming emissions.
Fact 3: Scientific studies increasingly show that health and productivity rise significantly if indoor temperature is cooled in hot weather. So cooling is not just about comfort.
Sum up these facts and it’s hard to escape: Today’s humans probably need air-conditioning if they want to thrive and prosper. Yet if all those new city dwellers use air-conditioning the way Americans do, life could be one stuttering series of massive blackouts, accompanied by disastrous planet-warming emissions.
What a quandary: live a modern life and see something never come to fruition sometime in the sometime sometime future possibly maybe perhaps, or give up our modern conveniences and still be at the mercy of nature?
It is easy to decry the problem but far harder to know what to do…
Lead the way, Elisabeth Rosenthal, and refuse to use the planet killing A/C.
I was listening from my living room in New York on a steamy Sunday morning. Given the topic of our conversation, I had the air-conditioner off, and the temperature was 85 or so. I couldn’t concentrate.
Hmm, didn’t work out to well, eh?
Since the article is no longer accepting comments (it was just posted on the 18th of August), I’ve sent a letter to the editor daring them all to give A/C up. Think the Times will print it?
Yes, it could be “stuttering” due to blackouts if the greens have any say. Let these people have access to cheap, affordable, reliable, dependable, and always-on energy, then everyone’s life will improve.
Improved lifestyles and living also reduces war.
I’d like her see give up A/C on the hot and muggy days of summer… not just the mild summer mornings. Let me hear how you do when its 110 and sun shining down, everyone has their windows and doors open, walking up and down the halls and stairs, airing out their armpits, wearing their grummiest clothing… .. let’s see how much you complain then Ms Opiner.
Remember when you had to shell out a hole handful of cash to have the Freon in your vehicle’s air conditioner removed, and replaced with something more expensive produced by the same manufacturer (whose patent coincidentally had run out at the same time)?
It was all done in the name of saving the planet from the massive man-eating ozone hole. Forget for a moment that Freon is four times heavier than air and couldn’t possibly be the cause in the stratosphere. That just confuses the issue. And, while you’re at it…forget that the chlorine present in the stratosphere was likely the direct result of evaporating sea water. That’s…you know…not important.
Just explain why I had to go through all that decades ago if 2008 showed the fifth largest Ozone hole ever…
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081105175154.htm
Oh…and when you plug up that disasterous ozone hole you will be causing global warming.
http://www.theozonehole.com/ozonecould.htm
I proclaim it all a crock of shit on a virtual cirle jerk.
Cheers,
The Worm
Yep, I remember that Worm. I also remember that the new freon is not as efficient as the old. And that the old freon is still used by manufacturers.
I remember being able to test and fill my own A/C car system myself. Now, I have to pay $200 for some wrench pusher to tell me nothing is wrong with my weak-ass A/C.
Yeah, funny that the first time they found the hole it was open. And, we jumped because they told us that it shouldn’t be open. Funny that. It is a naturally occurring hole that cycles open and close naturally. Funny that.
Funny that we are now told CO2 is the bad guy, yet methane and water vapor is much more potent for global warming process. CO2 is uber minor and man provides a micro-scale to that, with the major contributor being natural sources.
Funny that.
No solution? If they fear global warming they should try nuclear power. Duh.
No, no no.. you see, nuclear is just hot. think of all that heat that is generated and heats the water and air. that’s global warming, right there!
Not hard to know what to do. Here’s the three part plan: burn carbon, run A/Cs, tell greenies to shut up.
OK, Elizabeth, come down to Florida this August and convince one damned single person, you societal parasite.
A few Tues. morning links…
Very annoying tech problems today – more links etc later Gun porn! The crisis of women over-using medical services I should have said "over-utilizing" Knowledgable reader made me find out what a razee is “Beer + Pizza = Success.†The ke…
All BS. Other countries are using r290- propane. best refrig with no ozone depletion. Why not here?
Politics. No other reason. Its cheap too, compared to r22.