NY Times Environment Reporter Tells China and India: Just Sweat It Out
Elisabeth Rosenthal, an environment reporter who has blamed about every problem under the sun on global warming, called on China and India to turn off their air conditioners to save the planet in the Sunday Review – “Oh, to Be Warm In Summer’s Heat.”
Rosenthal's personal temperature preferences (she complains of shivering in air-conditoning crazy Hong Kong) are apparently to be locked in as global policy to fight greenhouse gases.
Why are airports, shops, offices and homes in the United States and elsewhere chilled to sweater-weather temperatures in summer when the temperature outside rises? “Everyone asks the question, but no one has a good answer,” said Fergus Nicol, a cooling expert and professor emeritus of architecture at London Metropolitan University. “I think it’s because air-conditioners are supposed to produce cool, so it has become an expectation.” Maybe, he said, there’s also a bit of “conspicuous consumption.”
Many energy experts recommend setting thermostats at 78 degrees in summer, to conserve energy and to combat rising greenhouse gas emissions. The exact energy savings depends on numerous factors, including the type of air-conditioning and the temperature outside. But turning up the programmable thermostat of a central air-conditioning system 1 degree can yield a 6 percent savings in energy used for cooling, according to the United States Energy Star program.
Still, few homes or buildings in the developed world seem to follow such impulses. Instead, they set summer thermostats in the low 70s or even the high 60s.
....
As more people in more countries come to rely on air-conditioning, the idea of thermal comfort may need to be rethought to curb the growth in greenhouse gas emissions. Ten years ago, when I lived in Beijing, air-conditioning was a rare luxury. On a visit there this month, I saw air-conditioners blasting even in rural restaurants. If hundreds of millions people in China and India expect to be cooled to our frigid standard of 71.6 degrees all the time, the environmental impact might be far less comfortable.
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Comments
Talk About Real Waste...
Submitted by Turn Right on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 9:51am.
I wonder if the Times has ever done a study on the environmental impact that their own newspaper has on the planet. Talk about something that we could do without!
Ask yourself this question, Ms. Rosenthal . . .
Submitted by Galvanic on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 9:55am.
. . . If two billion Indians and Chinese aren't cutting back on their carbon-emissions, what impact will 300 million Americans have doing so?
When was the last time that Al Gore spoke in China or India?
Why are airports, shops,
Submitted by Ed Gregory on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 10:36am.
Why are airports, shops, offices and homes in the United States and elsewhere chilled to sweater-weather temperatures in summer when the temperature outside rises? “Everyone asks the question, but no one has a good answer,” said Fergus Nicol, a cooling expert and professor emeritus of architecture at London Metropolitan University. “I think it’s because air-conditioners are supposed to produce cool, so it has become an expectation.” Maybe, he said, there’s also a bit of “conspicuous consumption.”
She's supposed to be a reporter for a major newspaper, yet these are the questions she asks and the answers she settles for? Remarkably stupid and lazy, yet somehow sufficient for her editor. And then there's this: As more people in more countries come to rely on air-conditioning, the idea of thermal comfort may need to be rethought to curb the growth in greenhouse gas emissions.
What is this, the 1940s? Is air conditioning some new emerging technology? Let me give you a hint on how to deal with cold buildings: put on that technicolor shawl you knitted with your hippie friends back in the day.
I wonder how Elisabeth
Submitted by Van Halen on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 10:59am.
I wonder how Elisabeth Rosenthal keeps cool in the summer and warm in the winter. I bet Princess doesn't have a moment of discomfort the whole year long!
Rosenthal has a minimal carbon footprint.
Submitted by SickofLibs on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 11:13am.
VERY minimal. Now let's all sing along:
"Eyebrows for sale or rent,
armpit hair to let fifty cents...
I hate AC
Submitted by Peter-in-NYC on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 11:52am.
I have to admit I sort of agree with Elisabeth Rosenthal about air conditioning. It is summer and I don't mind being a little warm. It does seem odd to me that we have to bundle up to go indoors. It can be 90 degrees outside but in the 60s inside. What would be so wrong with it being a bit warmer?
I work from home and seldom run the AC. I love the warmer weather, and I dread having to put on a sweatshirt in 90 degress so I can to a restaurant. But I think this is just part of the nanny state environment we live in too. 120 years ago Europeans went to Africa wearing the same wool suits they'd wear in London, and they dealt with it. Gradually they realized, "we need more appropriate attire," and they came up with lighter weight suits. Today we have to be made "comfortable" everywhere we go.
Can't we just wear short sleeves in the summer and deal with a bit of heat like people did for thousands of years? What is so wrong with it?
Also, hasn't it been proven that it is easier and cheaper to cool a building than heat it? I know my summertime bills are far less than those in the winter. The truth is that heat won't kill you as easily as the cold. People may say, "I prefer the cold," but tell them to sleep in 20 degrees as opposed to 90 degrees. You might wake up sweaty in 90 degrees, but you'd probably freeze to death at 20.
AC
Submitted by kata on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 11:57am.
When we lived on the East Coast and I would run summer errands that 90s-60s difference from store to store usually ended up making me feel physically ill by the end of the day.
You're comparison doesn't make sense, Peter
Submitted by Galvanic on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 3:56pm.
Comfort is all relative. There are elderly folks who will die in 90 degree heat.
But beyond that is the temp swing you offer. If we take a room temp of 74 degrees as the mean, and 90 degrees means an increasd of 16 degrees, then compare it to the temp 16 degrees less than 74 degrees, which is 58.
Would I rather sleep in 58 degrees or 90 degrees? The answer is easy: 58, because I can always add blankets.
Or go the other way. If 20 degrees is the low end, that's 54 degrees below the mean. Add 54 degrees to 74 degrees to get the high extreme, and you get 128 degrees. Which would I prefer? 20 degrees.
Official Response from the ChiComs:
Submitted by LibertyAtStake on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 8:38pm.
GFU NYT. A billion cool and comfortable peasants are much easier to govern than a billion hot and sweaty angry citizens.
d(^_^)b
http://libertyatstake.blogspot.com/
"Because the Only Good Progressive is a Failed Progressive"
Computer equipment just loves the heat and humidity.
Submitted by drsamherman on Wed, 08/31/2011 - 9:35pm.
So let Lizzie turn off her air conditioner. Her laptop will malfunction and we will not have to put up with her idiotic screed anymore.
Somebody should ask her exactly how she travels if she is such a rabid environmentalist. Does she take a horse and buggy or is she flying?
And would one of these environmentalists please explain to everyone why they carry a protest sign in one hand and an iPhone in the other? Do they think the iPhone and required transmission equipment run on squirrel-powered treadmills?