5 ms·

Why not? Is the solution that everyone boils? We have technology to tame the hot interior of buildings. To many people, it’s like Jehovah’s Witnesses and blood

Why not? Is the solution that everyone boils? We have technology to tame the hot interior of buildings. To many people, it’s like Jehovah’s Witnesses and blood transfusions though — irrational religious opposition to a modern tech that solves a problem. Just suffering through the heat is becoming a martyr for no good reason. It’s hot. Get air conditioning. Build some nuclear plants to make more clean electricity. Problem solved.

somethingnot 7y ago
> Build some nuclear plants to make more clean electricity. Problem solved. It doesn't work that way. Aircons dump unusable waste heat into the environment. On a large enought scale, it creates global warming on it's own. Same with solar panels, they change the albedo of the earth surface, and this will be a huge problem in the future.
- xyzzyz 7y ago
  > On a large enought scale, it creates global warming on it's own. Any amount of energy we can ever generate from nuclear is trivial compared to the insolation. Average daily insolation on Earth is 6 kWh/m^2. Earth area is 5.1e+14 m^2. This means we get 3e+15 kWh daily from sun, or 1.1e+18 kWh annually. On the other hand, we produce 2e+11 kWh electricity annually. This means that solar insolation is 7 orders of magnitude larger than our electricity production.
  - somethingnot 7y ago
    Which is why I mentioned that it will be a problem in the future, not today. Imagine all of India airconed. And it's also why I mentioned albedo. That will drastically increase the sun insolation effect, today a lot of the suns energy is reflected back into space. This will change, especially with solar panels.
    - xyzzyz 7y ago
      No, it won't ever become a problem. 7 orders of magnitude means we get 10 million times more energy from sun than we generate in electricity. Bringing rest of the world energy use to US/Europe standard will at worst result in 100 times more waste heat generation than now (and almost surely much less than that), which is still far cry from 10 million.
      - somethingnot 7y ago
        You assume that it's obvious that we can't consume 7 orders of magnitude more energy than now. We already grew our energy consumption 4 orders of magnitude in 300 years. http://bwp.io/blog/2014/thermodynamic-limits-of-human-energy-consumption-imposed-by-the-Earth/ http://bwp.io/blog/2014/thermodynamic-limits-of-human-energy...
        xyzzyz 7y ago
        Yes, it's obvious. There's no way a single person will consume as much energy as the whole country does today. These days, the energy use per capita goes down in developed countries, so the current energy consumption growth is mostly due to poorer places catching up.
        somethingnot 7y ago
        You seem very sure about how humanity will look like in 500 years and how much energy it would use. Obviously you consider the concept of Type II and Type III civilizations impossible and ridiculous, since they would use more than 20 orders of magnitude more energy than we do.
        xyzzyz 7y ago
        I consider talking about Type II and Type III civilizations ridiculous in the context of discussing potential increase in the use of air conditioning in India.
- xoa 7y ago
  Just to add to the other comment, I suggest you look up what the temperatures of the nighttime side of Mercury are (which receives max solar radiation intensity about 10x of Earth at ~14.4 kW/m^2 vs our max of ~1.4 kW/m^2 outside of atmosphere and ~1 kW/m^2 at the surface). Now reflect on the relative importance of absolute energy input vs retention.
maze-le 7y ago
You cannot cool down a building without making the exterior even warmer -- this is the second law of thermodynamics. The Problem is not "solved" by producing even more energy and thus generating entropy (unusable heat). Certain institutions need air conditioning though -- hospitals, elder care, etc. so I wouldn't forbid it outright -- but using AC everywhere seems excessive (written at 33°C at 20:23 in Germany).
- hluska 7y ago
  Geez, 33 degrees at 20:23? That’s absolutely brutal. I hope you and yours are doing okay.
  - maze-le 7y ago
    Thanks, I am fine, had a hard time concentrating at work today, but except for that I am doing well. I worry about the people with heart or circulatory conditions though -- not everyone is equipped to handle these temperatures.
- mrep 7y ago
  "For a 2014 paper, Francisco Salamanca and colleagues at Arizona State University modeled the effects of air conditioning on surface air temps in Phoenix. They found a nighttime increase of about 2°F (and nothing much during the day)" [0]. That doesn't sound like a big issue to me. [0]: https://www.popsci.com/ask-us-anything-does-using-ac-make-it-hotter-outside/ https://www.popsci.com/ask-us-anything-does-using-ac-make-it...
- xoa 7y ago
  >You cannot cool down a building without making the exterior even warmer -- this is the second law of thermodynamics. The Problem is not "solved" by producing even more energy and thus generating entropy (unusable heat). I don't understand why this particular total misunderstanding of physics comes up in so many contexts (a lot of anti-evolution types claimed it too in the past). The 2nd Law states that total entropy cannot decrease in a closed system. Yet a bit of reflection should reveal that somehow we manage to decrease local entropy all the time. In turn one may, once or twice, notice an enormous sphere of thermonuclear fusion in the sky that provides most of Earth's primary energy input. And at other times you may have noticed an enormous inky void into which energy can radiate away from Earth. Which should reveal that we in fact live in a locally open system, not a closed one. What controls the local general temperature is the equilibrium between energy input and what is radiated away. That's what greenhouse gasses change. So no, you're completely and utterly off, AC does not in any way cause any trouble when it comes to the problem of global warming. The energy after all would have been transformed to entropy regardless. What matters is the greenhouse gasses that exist in the atmosphere.
MrGilbert 7y ago
> Build some nuclear plants to make more clean electricity. Problem solved. Funny thing - the nuclear power plant in Grohnde, Lower-Saxony will be shut down for at least the next two days, because the river ("Weser"), which is used for cooling, is too hot. source: https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/technik/niedersachsen-weser-zu-warm-atomkraftwerk-grohnde-wird-abgeschaltet-a-1278987.html https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/technik/niedersachsen-we... (only german articles, sorry)
noonespecial 7y ago
A curious thing that people have no problem dumping endless kilowatts (and gas btu's) into their heaters all winter but a few watts of AC when its warm is environmental heresy and a sign of personal weakness. This despite the fact that heat-pump AC's use far less power. All I can figure is people have been heating themselves for 10's of thousands of years and AC is a distinctly modern phenomenon. From Mother Earth's perspective it would be far better for humanity to live in the tropics with AC than nearer the poles with heaters.
- ekr 7y ago
  Indeed, but you can also use an AC to heat a space, but the efficiency will go down as the outside temperature drops. Heat pumps work both ways.
- raverbashing 7y ago
  Might I add that some countries are especially known for liking their internal temperatures more in the tropical range even when outside temperatures are around 10C/15C and just natural heat from people would be enough to make it comfortable. AC is not a waste of electricity, quite the contrary, if it can be inverted (that is, pumping hot air in instead of out) then it's more efficient than electric heating.

somethingnot 7y ago

> Build some nuclear plants to make more clean electricity. Problem solved. It doesn't work that way. Aircons dump unusable waste heat into the environment. On a large enought scale, it creates global warming on it's own. Same with solar panels, they change the albedo of the earth surface, and this will be a huge problem in the future.

xyzzyz 7y ago
> On a large enought scale, it creates global warming on it's own. Any amount of energy we can ever generate from nuclear is trivial compared to the insolation. Average daily insolation on Earth is 6 kWh/m^2. Earth area is 5.1e+14 m^2. This means we get 3e+15 kWh daily from sun, or 1.1e+18 kWh annually. On the other hand, we produce 2e+11 kWh electricity annually. This means that solar insolation is 7 orders of magnitude larger than our electricity production.
- somethingnot 7y ago
  Which is why I mentioned that it will be a problem in the future, not today. Imagine all of India airconed. And it's also why I mentioned albedo. That will drastically increase the sun insolation effect, today a lot of the suns energy is reflected back into space. This will change, especially with solar panels.
  - xyzzyz 7y ago
    No, it won't ever become a problem. 7 orders of magnitude means we get 10 million times more energy from sun than we generate in electricity. Bringing rest of the world energy use to US/Europe standard will at worst result in 100 times more waste heat generation than now (and almost surely much less than that), which is still far cry from 10 million.
    - somethingnot 7y ago
      You assume that it's obvious that we can't consume 7 orders of magnitude more energy than now. We already grew our energy consumption 4 orders of magnitude in 300 years. http://bwp.io/blog/2014/thermodynamic-limits-of-human-energy-consumption-imposed-by-the-Earth/ http://bwp.io/blog/2014/thermodynamic-limits-of-human-energy...
      - xyzzyz 7y ago
        Yes, it's obvious. There's no way a single person will consume as much energy as the whole country does today. These days, the energy use per capita goes down in developed countries, so the current energy consumption growth is mostly due to poorer places catching up.
        somethingnot 7y ago
        You seem very sure about how humanity will look like in 500 years and how much energy it would use. Obviously you consider the concept of Type II and Type III civilizations impossible and ridiculous, since they would use more than 20 orders of magnitude more energy than we do.
        xyzzyz 7y ago
        I consider talking about Type II and Type III civilizations ridiculous in the context of discussing potential increase in the use of air conditioning in India.
xoa 7y ago
Just to add to the other comment, I suggest you look up what the temperatures of the nighttime side of Mercury are (which receives max solar radiation intensity about 10x of Earth at ~14.4 kW/m^2 vs our max of ~1.4 kW/m^2 outside of atmosphere and ~1 kW/m^2 at the surface). Now reflect on the relative importance of absolute energy input vs retention.

maze-le 7y ago

You cannot cool down a building without making the exterior even warmer -- this is the second law of thermodynamics. The Problem is not "solved" by producing even more energy and thus generating entropy (unusable heat). Certain institutions need air conditioning though -- hospitals, elder care, etc. so I wouldn't forbid it outright -- but using AC everywhere seems excessive (written at 33°C at 20:23 in Germany).

hluska 7y ago
Geez, 33 degrees at 20:23? That’s absolutely brutal. I hope you and yours are doing okay.
- maze-le 7y ago
  Thanks, I am fine, had a hard time concentrating at work today, but except for that I am doing well. I worry about the people with heart or circulatory conditions though -- not everyone is equipped to handle these temperatures.
mrep 7y ago
"For a 2014 paper, Francisco Salamanca and colleagues at Arizona State University modeled the effects of air conditioning on surface air temps in Phoenix. They found a nighttime increase of about 2°F (and nothing much during the day)" [0]. That doesn't sound like a big issue to me. [0]: https://www.popsci.com/ask-us-anything-does-using-ac-make-it-hotter-outside/ https://www.popsci.com/ask-us-anything-does-using-ac-make-it...
xoa 7y ago
>You cannot cool down a building without making the exterior even warmer -- this is the second law of thermodynamics. The Problem is not "solved" by producing even more energy and thus generating entropy (unusable heat). I don't understand why this particular total misunderstanding of physics comes up in so many contexts (a lot of anti-evolution types claimed it too in the past). The 2nd Law states that total entropy cannot decrease in a closed system. Yet a bit of reflection should reveal that somehow we manage to decrease local entropy all the time. In turn one may, once or twice, notice an enormous sphere of thermonuclear fusion in the sky that provides most of Earth's primary energy input. And at other times you may have noticed an enormous inky void into which energy can radiate away from Earth. Which should reveal that we in fact live in a locally open system, not a closed one. What controls the local general temperature is the equilibrium between energy input and what is radiated away. That's what greenhouse gasses change. So no, you're completely and utterly off, AC does not in any way cause any trouble when it comes to the problem of global warming. The energy after all would have been transformed to entropy regardless. What matters is the greenhouse gasses that exist in the atmosphere.

MrGilbert 7y ago

> Build some nuclear plants to make more clean electricity. Problem solved. Funny thing - the nuclear power plant in Grohnde, Lower-Saxony will be shut down for at least the next two days, because the river ("Weser"), which is used for cooling, is too hot. source: https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/technik/niedersachsen-weser-zu-warm-atomkraftwerk-grohnde-wird-abgeschaltet-a-1278987.html https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/technik/niedersachsen-we... (only german articles, sorry)

noonespecial 7y ago

A curious thing that people have no problem dumping endless kilowatts (and gas btu's) into their heaters all winter but a few watts of AC when its warm is environmental heresy and a sign of personal weakness. This despite the fact that heat-pump AC's use far less power. All I can figure is people have been heating themselves for 10's of thousands of years and AC is a distinctly modern phenomenon. From Mother Earth's perspective it would be far better for humanity to live in the tropics with AC than nearer the poles with heaters.

ekr 7y ago
Indeed, but you can also use an AC to heat a space, but the efficiency will go down as the outside temperature drops. Heat pumps work both ways.
raverbashing 7y ago
Might I add that some countries are especially known for liking their internal temperatures more in the tropical range even when outside temperatures are around 10C/15C and just natural heat from people would be enough to make it comfortable. AC is not a waste of electricity, quite the contrary, if it can be inverted (that is, pumping hot air in instead of out) then it's more efficient than electric heating.