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When it's hot and humid out and the air-conditioner's not running, America suffers.
Babies break out in rashes, couples bicker, computers go haywire. In much of the
nation, an August power outage is viewed not as an inconvenience but as a public
health emergency.
In the 50 years since air-conditioning hit the mass market, America has become so
well-addicted that our dependence goes almost entirely unremarked. A/C is built
into our economy and our culture. Stepping from a torrid parking lot into a 72-
degree, air-conditioned lobby can provide a degree of instantaneous relief and
physical pleasure experienced through few other legal means. But if the effect of air-
conditioning on a hot human being can be compared to that of a pain-relieving drug,
its economic impact is more like that of an anabolic steroid. And withdrawal, when
it comes, will be painful.
Almost one kilowatt-hour of electricity out of every five consumed in the United
States in a full year goes to cooling buildings. Much of the nation's excess power-
generating capacity, which sits idle until needed to satisfy quick spikes in demand,
has had to be built because of air-conditioning.
The refreshing air that comes out of an air-conditioning system has an evil twin:
carbon-laden exhaust from the utilities that power it. Just about 50 percent of U.S.
electricity is generated with coal; 21 percent with other fossil fuels, mostly natural
gas; 20 percent with nuclear fission; less than 7 percent with hydroelectric dams;
and about 2 percent with biomass, wind and solar methods combined. Coal is the
worst carbon dioxide producer, but all of those methods generate greenhouse gases
and other ecological hazards during construction and operation.
In January, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) raised energy-efficiency
standards for newly manufactured home central air-conditioners by 30 percent.
Central air units typically last 15 to 20 years, so the new regulation will have little
effect in the near future. Even if all units were replaced overnight, it would mean
less than a 5 percent reduction in the power that's used to air-condition buildings.
That's because the new rules don't apply to window units or to nonresidential air-
conditioning.
The average household in the southeastern United States consumes almost twice as
much electricity as the average household in New England, but air-conditioning
doesn't account for that entire disparity. Southerners use a lot more power for all
appliances, whatever the season. Of course, northern households consume more
fossil fuel for heat, but in the dead of winter, heating cannot be dispensed with.
(The long-running debate over whether you'll use less gas on a long highway trip by
keeping the windows open -- which increases the car's aerodynamic drag -- or
rolling them up and turning on the AC -- which puts an extra load on the engine --
seems to have ended in a tie.)
About 5.5 percent of the gasoline burned annually by America's cars and light trucks
-- 7 billion gallons -- goes to run air-conditioners. That's equivalent to the total oil
consumption of Indonesia, a petroleum-rich country with a population size
comparable to ours. Four states -- California, Arizona, Texas and Florida -- account
for 35 percent of that extra fuel consumption.
Since the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, there
has been a major shift in types of refrigerants used in air-conditioning and
refrigeration. In particular, highly ozone-threatening chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are
being phased out, most quickly in wealthier countries.
CFCs not only damage ozone, they also have the highest global-warming potential.
But all commonly used refrigerants are greenhouse gases, and every pound produced
is destined eventually to escape into the atmosphere during manufacture, use,
recharge, recycling, disposal.
Finally, in counting costs, it's important to consider not only fuel and refrigerants but
also the materials -- steel, copper, plastics and a lot more -- that have gone into
building up the nation's colossal tonnage of air-conditioning capacity.
Georgescu-Roegen wrote in his 1971 book "The Entropy Law and the Economic
Process" that despite the neat, closed-loop flow charts depicted in textbooks, the
economic process "is not circular but unidirectional. As far as this facet alone is
concerned, the economic process consists of a continuous transformation of low
entropy into high entropy, that is, into irrevocable waste."
As it creates fleeting enjoyment through a state of low entropy (in this case, an
island of coolness in a sea of heat) but only by increasing entropy at an even faster
rate elsewhere (by using up fuels and materials and releasing useless wastes), air-
conditioning is a poster child for the inevitable decay that, according to Georgescu-
Roegen, is a defining characteristic of economic growth.
It's no coincidence that when the first modern central air-conditioning system was
installed back in 1902, it was to cool the New York Stock Exchange.
Today, process AC systems account for less than 8 percent as much energy
consumption as comfort systems. With the big shift from manufacturing to low-
wage, white-collar jobs in the past two decades, more people than ever are working
in environments with comfort air-conditioning. But in most manufacturing plants,
air-conditioning is targeted only where needed, more to the benefit of equipment,
inputs and products than of people.
Traditionally, humans have dealt with heat and humidity by cutting back on physical
activity in the middle of the day, maybe even taking a siesta. That was before
economic "competitiveness" became a universally accepted end in itself.
A story by a trade magazine on a South Carolina plastic sign factory where workers
endured summer temperatures of 110 degrees listed the effects of such heat on
workers' performance: inconsistency, inability to concentrate, negativity,
drowsiness, headache, fatigue and vulnerability to accidents. The magazine noted
that "deliberate work slowdowns, walkouts and similar job actions occur over heat
problems more than any other workplace hazard."
Managers at the South Carolina plant considered and rejected heat stress remedies
recommended by the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, such as
allowing longer rest periods in a cooler area. They calculated that a single daily rest
period of ten minutes for their 100-person work force would cost them $20,000 over
a summer. As a cheaper remedy that wouldn't slow production, the company settled
on large, high-capacity ceiling fans, which cost 1/28 as much as air-conditioning to
install and 1/10 as much in electricity to run.
The employees would probably have preferred to have both the improved air
circulation and more breaks from the heat, but no workers were quoted in the article.
Invigorating consumption
In describing the "Hot America" of the old days, the National Building Museum's
exhibit painted a picture of a nation with sagging summer productivity, but more
importantly, a nation with better things to do than to go shopping. It read in part,
A society that follows "seasonal cycles determined by the weather" is not an easy
place to keep consumer demand calibrated to a constant, frenetic level. Movie
theaters were among the first businesses to use air-conditioning, turning summer
from a down-time into a boom-time. Now, almost all retailing depends on gathering
large numbers of people into controlled environments and inducing them not just to
buy what they came for but to "go shopping."
Air-conditioning can also make big purchases more attractive. You can't fully enjoy
a jumbo-screen TV, a PC, an SUV or an RV unless you have AC. It allows you to
grill steaks in the comfort of the kitchen, play indoor golf when it's too hot outdoors
or, as President Richard Nixon used to do, enjoy your fireplace even in summer.
Redefining comfort
Lehigh University professor Gail Cooper documents how that happened, in her 1998
book "Air Conditioning America: Engineers and the Controlled Environment, 1900-
1960." The post-World War II building boom, she observes, provided a golden
opportunity to design buildings that would accommodate, even require, a central air-
conditioning system, which at that time was a technological marvel in search of a
market.
To make new buildings affordable despite the huge expense of cooling systems,
homes were stripped of their heavier construction materials, large eaves, high
ceilings, attic fans, and cross-ventilated design. (Cooper quotes the May, 1953 issue
of Fortune magazine, which described the mass-produced home of the day as a
"TV-equipped hotbox.") Office buildings became massive cubes; expensive,
window-accommodating H- T- and L- shaped footprints were out. Extra insulation
and other conservation measures were regarded as too costly; it wasn't the architects
or builders who'd be paying the utility bills.
Much of that 1950s construction tradition has hung on throughout the Age of Air
Conditioning. But change is coming -- slowly. By 2010, 5 percent to 10 percent of
new, nonresidential construction is expected to be of certified "green buildings,"
which can be 30 percent more energy-efficient than standard buildings, while they
use more ecologically friendly refrigerants. Part of the reduction in summer energy
use can be achieved by use of natural ventilation, architectural shading and other
built-in features. But making a serious dent in that 18 percent of all U.S. electricity
consumption that goes to air-conditioning will require more than that.
Meanwhile, the high standard that's been set for passenger comfort is helping doom
efforts to run cars and trucks on alternative fuels. In 2005, air-conditioners in U.S.
vehicles burned up the equivalent of the nation's entire fuel-ethanol production --
twice.
If the United States is going to get serious about the deep cuts in energy
consumption that are needed, the whole idea of air-conditioning has to be
questioned. In doing that, we can't depend only on ourselves, as individuals, to resist
that most physically seductive of technologies. It will require big shifts in public
policies that affect economic growth, achieved democratically rather than in quiet --
and artificially cooled -- White House meetings or raucous stock markets.
This story is the first in a two-part series on how air-conditioning has changed
society. Next week: How air-conditioning may have helped elect George W. Bush.
Stan Cox is a plant breeder and writer in Salina, Kansas (average high for the past
week: 95 degrees).