This is completely ridiculous you just need to let people use AC properly and it will solve most of the problem with people dying. That doesn’t mean you need to go from place to place in AC or never be out of AC, but every person in southern Europe should have an AC unit in their bedroom and deaths will go down substantially.

Another thing that would help is if Europe stopped being so averse to new construction so that people could build new buildings with central AC that matches the current reality of its climate and demographics, rather than the climate and demographics of last millennium.

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crote an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> you just need to let people use AC properly (..) every person in southern Europe should have an AC unit in their bedroom and deaths will go down substantially.

Yes, exactly: install AC where it truly helps and where it is truly needed. That's the point I was trying to make. Most of the rest is solved far more efficient by things like installing shades. In other words: don't go all-out on giant whole-home AC without first stopping the huge inflow of new heat.

> if Europe stopped being so averse to new construction

We're not, there's plenty of new construction over in Europe.

The difference is that European buildings are built to last, so structurally there's no need to tear them down after a couple of decades. They are perfectly usable for another half-century after a minor renovation (including retrofitting AC!), so why destroy a charming historic district for absolutely no reason?

That doesn't mean buildings are never torn down, of course. Right now a lot of post-WWII rental units are being replaced by new construction, as they are architecturally nothing special and renovating them to modern standards is simply way more expensive than replacing them entirely.

	▲	tgsovlerkhgsel 2 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		I get rage when I hear those "5 clever tips to stay cool without A/C". Many buildings already have shades, but please tell me more how those shades and "properly ventilating during the night" (aka not getting sleep half the night due to outside noise) will keep my apartment at a livable temperature when the air temperature outside never drops below 23 degrees for more than an hour. You can't effectively remove the heat that has pooled in the apartment with a 2-3 degree temperature difference, let alone in the few hours where you actually have that difference. So because of thinking like the one in your post, we can't have real AC's (because to "protect the environment" we'd first need to install every other system that doesn't help then prove that with a mountain of paperwork), so my only option is to open the well-insulated window so I can stick the coolant hose of a portable unit through it. I think the "properly installed AC bad" mentality will only change once the entire population of renters has those inefficient portable units (that are de facto impossible to regulate) and even the anti-AC group realizes that encouraging "real" ACs is much better than the workarounds that the status quo forces.

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MrDresden an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

> "Another thing that would help is if Europe..."

Europe is a continent with a lot of different countries, all with different laws and regulations. Even the ones who are in the European Union have different rules and regulations.

So please realize that any blanket statements about Europe work as well as making one about the Americas (ie North/South).

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nikanj 43 minutes ago | parent [-]

Europeans say ”Americans xxx while the French yyy” all the time. Member states should be compared to member states, or the US to the EU.

	▲	leononame 2 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		A US state is not a country. I get that there is a lot of federalism in the US and that states often have different laws and regulations, but the same is true for European countries. You can compare the US to Germany, or Sourh Carolina to Bavaria, by your own logic.