Air Conditioning in Europe Is Limited by Climate Policy

Visitors to the World Cup games in the United States are awed by the availability of ice for drinks and the air conditioning in most facilities, including homes. Media reports of this have surprised Americans because more than nine out of 10 households here have air conditioning, and in much of the southern United States, nearly all households do. In contrast, only about 20% of homes across Europe have air conditioning, and in the United Kingdom, the figure is less than 5%. In 1975, a larger percentage of American households had air conditioning than European households today – fifty years later. Even more Mexican homes have air conditioning than European homes. That is due in part to European policy discouraging the use of air conditioning to reduce electricity consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. European policymakers view air conditioning as environmentally undesirable.

However, it is the wealthy elites, those who often endorse limiting air conditioning use, who most often have air conditioning in Europe. The hypocrisy is evident in the European Commission, which, during a severe heatwave in Brussels, shut off the air conditioning for lower-level employees but kept it running on the upper floors where top executives work.

Europeans are currently experiencing a heat wave that began on June 20 and is progressing across Europe, prompting alcohol bans and the cancellation of mass gatherings in France, melting road surfaces in Germany, and twisting rail tracks in Sweden. Temperatures have peaked in France and Britain, with June records broken. Paris hit a June record high of 40.9°C (105.6°F). Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization, noted on social media that more than 1,300 excess deaths “linked to high temperatures in Europe” had been recorded since June 21. Across the continent, cultural landmarks have been forced to close, and farming has suffered. Asian air-conditioning manufacturers reported a boom in European sales. Air conditioning is common in major cities across Asia, but most of the housing stock in northern Europe, where temperatures are normally chilly to mild, was not built to withstand heat but rather to keep it in.

Officials in France reported that the heat had already been responsible for roughly 1,000 excess deaths. Eighty-five percent of the dead were aged 65 or older, though increases were seen across all age groups. According to France’s interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, 74 people had died by drowning since June 18. The state-owned ‌power utility in France, ⁠EDF, pledged to spend €80 million ($90 million) on cooling systems for schools and day-care centers.

According to doctors in Britain, the hot weather was affecting critical medical equipment such as MRI scanners and cancer treatment machines in hospitals. A temperature of 36.9 C (98.4 F) broke the British record for the hottest June day on three successive days. Hundreds of schools were closed, and calls to London’s emergency services for help were up 50%. Electric fans were hard to find in Britain due to high demand. According to Anthony Watts’ climate realism article, British building regulations and planning guidance have long emphasized “passive cooling” while treating air conditioning as something to be avoided whenever possible. Many British homes, schools, offices, and even some hospitals were built or renovated without air conditioning.

The heatwave, which has pushed temperatures as much as 18 C above their seasonal average according to the Reuters Climate Monitor, is being driven by a weather pattern known as an Omega block that traps a ball of hot air over regions for extended periods, with cooler air on its fringes. The ​present heatwave moved up from the Iberian Peninsula towards ​Western Europe and is expected to begin shifting by the end ⁠of the month, hitting central Europe and the Balkans, according to the World Meteorological Organization.

Europeans want to blame the heat wave, or at least its severity, on climate change, but Europe has experienced devastating heat waves for centuries, including the notorious heat waves and accompanying droughts of 1473 and 1540.  There was a deadly 2003 European heat wave. During that heat wave, 15,000 people were estimated to have died in France. Heat waves occurred throughout the twentieth century. In 1976, the British Isles heatwave occurred when the Earth was cooling, and many scientists were warning that the next ice age could be coming. According to Anthony Watts’ climate realism article, Omega block heat domes develop because of atmospheric circulation patterns, persistent high-pressure systems, soil moisture conditions, and regional weather dynamics. They are short-term weather events that have existed for as long as humanity has existed and long before weather was studied.

Conclusion

The heat wave hitting Europe is causing deaths, as Europeans have nowhere to go: only about 20% of households have air conditioning, and most other facilities, including schools, are without it. European policymakers view air conditioning as environmentally undesirable because their goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions rather than to ensure affordable, reliable, and abundant electricity for the masses. The major hypocrisy is that those homes with air conditioning are most often owned by the elite, who are the ones who endorse limited air conditioning for others. Europe has lower air-conditioning adoption than even some third-world countries. According to the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, air conditioning is one of the most significant public health interventions in history, averting hundreds of thousands of premature heat-related deaths annually.  And residential cooling has become a critical lifeline, especially for elderly and vulnerable populations.