How Americans keep cool
The US has approximately 5% of the world's population. And uses 25% of the world's electricity. And fully one third of that goes on air conditioning.
That's 8% of the world's electricity on keeping Americans cool.
Seven billion gallons of petrol a year are used in US car air-con systems - equivalent to the total oil consumption of Indonesia, population 240 million.
What's more, the Chinese haven't even got started. Every ten days another coal-fired power plant opens somewhere in China big enough to serve all the households in Dallas. The Chinese already use more coal than the US, the EU and Japan combined. And they are getting the air-con bug: the market has grown by 70% each year - partly because the Chinese want their homes to be as cool and as comfortable as those of the Americans.
But what happens is that with the swirling around of air, the temperature is raised for everyone else, meaning more people get air conditioners to keep cool, raising the temperature even more for those around.
Next thing we`ll have real global warming just because we are trying to be cool. Time for a break. Tell the Chinese and Americans to take a cold shower. Eat an ice block. Sit in the shade. Save some power, save some petrol, unwind those car windows.
Check out the full article here
Hattip Kester Brewin
1 comment:
All those countries close to the equator will have air conditioning in jsut about every public space at some point - imagine what that will be like for india - afterall it is hot jsut about everywhere there and with a billion odd poeple to keep cool...
In the long run it will take VERY high fuel costs to stop them using it...
So what to do?
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