Our focus comes from Yale's "Environment 360" news blog this week, with an article bringing to attention the consequences of an air-conditioned world. With scorching summers as of recent, most Americans know just how comforting it is to flip a switch in their home or office to beat the heat and enjoy an artificial ice box. In fact, Americans have partitioned more energy for air conditioning use than any other nation over time. However, the article's author, Stan Cox, warns that this convenience is on the path to increased air conditioning use globally - posing a threat to not only the environment, but society and human interaction as well.
Other nations are beginning to artificially cool their buildings more and more, and the U.S is definitely not a model of restraint. Because in most countries air conditioners run on electricity generated from fossil fuels, this poses a threat to the environment with increased carbon emissions that will influence global climate change. Likewise, the phenomenon of air conditioning is a social one that holds consequences in the ability to "live with" higher temperatures, the amount of time spent indoors, and the amount of time removed from the community as a whole because of proclivity for the cooler indoors. Air conditioning, which once was a luxury and a haven from extremely hot temperatures, has transformed into something that Americans have come to take for granted; and the rest of the world might be on the same track.
To read the article in more detail, please follow this link:
http://e360.yale.edu/feature/cooling_a_warming_planet_a_global_air_conditioning_surge/2550/
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