Energy & Environment

Joe Lancaster | 9.4.2024 10:10 AM

In a guest essay in The New York Times, Stan Cox of The Land Institute made the case for swearing off air conditioning to lessen the severity of climate change. It sounds like a miserable way to live—and thankfully, there are better ways to accomplish the same goal.

"The greenhouse gases created by the roughly 90 percent of American households that own A.C. units mean that running them even in balmy temperatures is making the climate crisis worse," Cox writes. Further, "air-conditioning has altered the way most Americans experience heat. Our bodies have grown so accustomed to climate-controlled indoor spaces, set at a chilly 69 degrees, that anything else can feel unbearable."

Despite living in Kansas, Cox says he has lived most of his life without air conditioning, making only a handful of exceptions each year during heat waves or when having guests over.

"We rely on electric fans, which consume only about 2 percent of the energy needed to air-condition one room," he writes. "We also kept other appliances and devices turned off as much as possible because they, too, generate heat." He and his wife don't have a dishwasher, they dry their laundry on a clothesline, and they keep the........

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