4 ms·

Sure, but when air-conditioning would be used that equation flips around. Not only do you lose electricity as heat, you need to use more electricity to countera

Sure, but when air-conditioning would be used that equation flips around. Not only do you lose electricity as heat, you need to use more electricity to counteract that heat. And in most places, far more money is spent on cooling than heating. Even in the frozen wastelands of Minnesota where I live, air-conditioning costs over the summer are about equal to heating costs over the winter. As others have mentioned, heat pumps and gas furnaces are much more economical than resistive heating via incandescent lights.

flubert 10y ago
>And in most places, far more money is spent on cooling than heating. Hmm. I've always heard the opposite. Anyway, here's one piece of research. http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/014050;jsessionid=7C44E1B7D1A0820B5172272C0C0C55F6.c2.iopscience.cld.iop.org http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/0140... "Abstract Energy demand for climate control was analyzed for Miami (the warmest large metropolitan area in the US) and Minneapolis (the coldest large metropolitan area). The following relevant parameters were included in the analysis: (1) climatological deviations from the desired indoor temperature as expressed in heating and cooling degree days, (2) efficiencies of heating and cooling appliances, and (3) efficiencies of power-generating plants. The results indicate that climate control in Minneapolis is about 3.5 times as energy demanding as in Miami. This finding suggests that, in the US, living in cold climates is more energy demanding than living in hot climates."