A lot of the need for AC (and having lights on) is just really, really bad modern house design. I recently finished building a house (my first one) and everyone

A lot of the need for AC (and having lights on) is just really, really bad modern house design. I recently finished building a house (my first one) and everyone acted like I was crazy for not building in central air conditioning. I built in an older style, with windows on every side, with a mind towards ventilation and light. Inexplicably most houses in the area, even $500k+ houses do not have these two things. My mom's condo has central air but the system is so feeble and the venting upstairs so poor that two bedrooms in the house remain stuffy anyways. It seems like light and natural ventilation are not even afterthoughts, but non-thoughts, and the designs all rely on electric light and forced air. I also built 9 foot ceilings on the first floor and 8.5 on the second. Then I placed the attic (3rd story) door centrally in the upstairs hallway. The result of the design is that airflow moves on the first floor in all directions, and upward, and on the second floor can move at least east-west (bathroom and hallway windows), and also north-south if bedroom doors are open. Finally, air flows upwards to the attic, which has windows north-south. If I close windows in the morning and open around 7pm, the result is that the house stays very cool, about(? only tested with temp gun a few times) 74 downstairs and 76 upstairs during these 90 degree days, and then gets cooler at night as I open windows again. So far, I've only bought one fan, though things might work better with more. Note I'm not an expert or an architect, I just included some design features that should be obvious to anyone who's lived in an old house for a summer. This takes some manual control, but there are far fewer parts to maintain (this was a general design goal beyond AC), and last month's electric bill was $54 (New Hampshire).