In the past with harmful refrigerants and lack of renewable energy AC simply was not justifiable in most of Europe. Progress on both fronts plus global warming is changing that only recently.

▲

bee_rider 2 hours ago | parent [-]

On the bright side they’ve probably waited long enough to roll out heat pumps instead of window ACs, right?

▲

quantummagic 2 hours ago | parent [-]

As far as I know, a heat pump and an AC unit are essentially identical. Although some heat pumps can be reversed, and act as heaters in the winter. But one isn't more efficient than the other, they employ the exact same physical refrigeration cycle.

	▲	bee_rider an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Oh, I had them filed in by brain under “more efficient temperature control” but it looks like they don’t have an advantage over ACs when cooling. (Just over typical heaters, when heating). Oops.
	▲	wil421 an hour ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		That’s true however moving heat in the winter is much better than burning things. Gas furnaces are 80%-98% efficient, heat pumps are 300-400%.
	▲	coryrc 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I think GP's point is that winter heating can shift to nuclear- and wind-powered instead of mostly burning fossil fuels.