Just insulate the houses in the US. I am always shocked how badly built US houses that cost 600k are.
Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
71–80 of 349 posts
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Off the top of my head, * A lot of home conditioners are fighting the weather in conditions with poor insulation, running when nobody is home, or running in rooms when people are in different parts of the house. * Office air conditioners are often set too cold, subjectively speaking, sometimes resulting in workers bringing sweaters or even space heaters to their desks. This is shockingly common. Multi-zone cooling ca…
All the more reason we need to find a way to make remote work work for positions and jobs that allow it. Most people are already heating and cooling their homes while away at the office. How much energy can we save and how much more comfortable can we be if we work from our homes? Additionally less energy is consumed and less pollution generated from not having to commute.
Bingo!
WFH = less traffic, less industrial building construction, less heating/cooling of empty spaces (offices at night, homes during day), less indoor lighting usage (homes are usually very well lit from outside light while most cubical jungles are lit by fluorescent lighting).
Wanna save the environment? WFH!
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#73[SPOILER ALERT] Can we change the post title to match the article? "If You Fix This, You Fix a Big Piece of the Climate Puzzle"
I much prefer my post titles to be spoilers, rather than clickbait. I waste less of my life that way.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#74I'm pretty disappointed in the numbers they chose for a vegetarian diet. It feels to me as if they actively went ahead and picked to lowest values they could find in their source. (Btw the source itself is a good read imo: http://www.drawdown.org/solutions/food/plant-rich-diet ) You could argue that people are not willing to go vegetarian or even vegan - but at least level the numbers when comparing it with other sol…
All due respect to the Zen master, but taking fewer flights, driving less, and living in a smaller and better insulated house, or having fewer kids, will all be more effective than vegetarianism for the average American. A single transatlantic trip emits more CO2 than eating meat for a year.
See this paper on effective CO2 reductions: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aa7541
I speak without bias on the subject, since I am actually a vegetarian myself. Going by the numbers, it's moderately effective, but not the most effective.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#75> The Lawrence Berkeley study argues that even a 30 percent improvement in efficiency could avoid the peak load equivalent of about 1,500 power plants by 2030. Okay, but where is this 30% jump in efficiency going to come from? That seems like a pretty big leap!
Off the top of my head, * A lot of home conditioners are fighting the weather in conditions with poor insulation, running when nobody is home, or running in rooms when people are in different parts of the house. * Office air conditioners are often set too cold, subjectively speaking, sometimes resulting in workers bringing sweaters or even space heaters to their desks. This is shockingly common. Multi-zone cooling ca…
Ceiling fans reduce the need for AC, especially overnight - even gentle circulation makes a noticeable difference. Also, an attic fan that can blow cool overnight air through the building whenever the temperature and humidity outside are acceptably low might reduce the expenditure of AC on cooling down the structure. A small degree of automation would allow these measures to work together with the AC.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#76> The Lawrence Berkeley study argues that even a 30 percent improvement in efficiency could avoid the peak load equivalent of about 1,500 power plants by 2030. Okay, but where is this 30% jump in efficiency going to come from? That seems like a pretty big leap!
Off the top of my head, * A lot of home conditioners are fighting the weather in conditions with poor insulation, running when nobody is home, or running in rooms when people are in different parts of the house. * Office air conditioners are often set too cold, subjectively speaking, sometimes resulting in workers bringing sweaters or even space heaters to their desks. This is shockingly common. Multi-zone cooling ca…
In addition to men preferring cooler temperatures in general (probably for metabolic reasons), men in offices are usually required to wear warmer clothing than women (though anecdotally I suspect that because of the AC, pantsuits are becoming more popular).
In one office I worked at, the AC controls were not accessible, and because there was no dress code whatsoever, everyone complained about the temperatures being too low. There was a TI office in the same building, and because everyone was in business casual or higher, they didn't have the same problems.
Designing uniforms which look professional and composed but which also ventilate correctly could considerably raise optimal office temperatures.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#77American air conditioners running at full power, chilling the interior and dripping on the sidewalk below on a hot day always deeply trouble me. Maybe it's my european view on things, but for contrast here in Munich we aren't just building out a city-wide heat network, but we also have a cold network! Cold river water flows through the pipe network that traverses the city and large office building can get connected t…
See elsewhere regarding Americans using way too much air conditioning, but to be fair, Munich is a pretty cold place compared to much of the US in the summer. And not nearly as humid as much of the southern/eastern US.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are standardized efficiency measurements that all A/C manufacturers must conduct and publish in the US. You'll see terms like COP, EER, and SEER. Those allow you to compare pretty easily. Currently the minimum is a SEER of 13, but I've seen units as high as 22 advertised.
Higher is better in this case?
Yes.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#79One thing missing from this article is demand response:
"It matters, researchers say, because cooling has a direct relationship with the building of coal-fired power plants to meet peak demand. If more air-conditioners are humming in more homes and offices, then more capacity will be required to meet the demand. So 1.6 billion new air-conditioners by 2050 means thousands of new power plants will have to come on line to support them."
We https://flair.co offer demand response tech for minisplit control that can help prevent having to build all the 'peaker plants'. This gets extra interesting when you add intermittent supply (solar/wind) and grid tied storage (Tesla has been making big pushes here among others). Hopefully, we are able to scale these up in parallel to prevent a bunch of coal fired plants from being built for the 1-3% of the year with the hottest days.
Re: Improving air conditioner efficiency could reduce worldwide temps
#80Trump's 2018 budget zeroes funding for Energy Star, which among other things, helps consumers pick the most efficient devices, save money in the long run. What other ways can consumers compare the efficiency of A/C units? I would think some standardized testing and labels would be required.
Fortunately, the actual spending decisions are made by Congress, so the content of the President's proposed budget doesn't matter.
I think "don't worry; the Republican-controlled Congress will not cut funding on environmental initiatives" sounds like a bit of a pollyannaish proposition.