Summary of 'The Case Against Air Conditioning

 

The Case Against Air Conditioning

The author’s message is that A.C. keeps us inside and away from interacting with one another. We shouldn’t be trapped inside everyday but we should be out and about to enjoy the world around us.

This essay is about why Washington/America should stop using air conditioners in everyday life with the expectation of hospitals, archives, and cooling centers. The author supports his argument by providing examples of wat Washington would look like without air conditioners at work, at home, and around town. Cox’s starts out with using modern day examples of people using air conditioning to beat the Heat and why it is bad.

Cox’s wants readers to turn down, turn off, or just complete eliminate air conditioning use. He believes that it will benefit us by making neighborhoods more friendly, laws more lax, and climate change less of an issue.

People in Washington didn’t have to experience extreme heat because their houses were equipped with air conditioner. Air conditioner not only reduces heat but increases electricity-bill and helps increase green house effects. This isn’t smart activity because we are ruining our own environment. Refrigerators burn fossil fuels, which emits greenhouse gases. The green house gases raise global temperatures. As a result, we will need more air-conditioning.

America is one of the world’s highest greenhouse-gas emitting countries. Now the consumption of electricity in America has doubled since the early 1990s.

Less than half a century ago, America used very little air conditioning devices. Americans can return to the pre-air conditioning state by reducing the use of air conditioners. The air conditioning machines should be allowed to use only in important places such as hospitals, archives, and cooling centers. The author imagines a very beautiful America if air conditioners can be banned to use in houses.

At work

If we remove air conditioners, we can experience very different workplaces. During summers, workers will get more flexible and more relaxed time because offices will be closed and they will have very little working hours. All offices will be equipped with large open windows, ceiling fans, window fans and desk fans and American office will look like they used to be before the arrival of air conditioners.

The government will also have to provide more holidays to its workers. And the nation will enjoy little economic burden by reducing the cost of running the government. There will be less laws passed in the parliament, and the activities of lobbyists will also decline. There will be less hatching of new schemes or plotting.

The parliament sessions will be adjourned during the summer. During warm spring and fall days, hearings will be held under the cool shade of trees in the lawns. This will obviously help overcome the present climate change problems.

 At home

The house owners will open their windows to let in fresh air and cool air which are mostly closed now due to fear of theft and crimes.

People will now construct high ceilings with better cross-ventilators and windows, install more fans, and paint their roofs white to reflect solar rays to make their homes cool and comfortable to live in during the hot seasons. At a result electricity bill with reduce. There will be no washing machines, and every house will be seen with clotheslines where they will keep their clothes to dry from the direct sunlight. People will eat grilled foods and have their dinner on the porch.

Around town

Post AC towns will be overcrowded with people from the neighborhood. There will be more spending their time outdoors particularly in the late afternoon and evening, when temperatures fall more quickly outside than they do inside their homes. As a result, socializing during the summers will become common.

Rather than sitting and entertaining alone in one’s rom, people in the neighborhood will get time to know one another. Because there are the more people outside, there will be less crime and people will feel safer.

Deaths of elderly people inside their apartments will also decline because they will be spending more time outside. They will get immediate care from the public than they were at homes.

Most people will now opt for cycling. There will be no school days for kids during hot season. Children will also spend more time outside, somewhere in the shady playgrounds and water sprinklers will also increase in every neighborhood.

All houses will have green roofs due to grasses, vegetables, etc. More greenery will be seen around the city. There will be more green tops of government and commercial buildings. These tops will obviously reduce the room temperature.