Implications of Increasing Household Air Conditioning Use Across the United States Under a Warming Climate

Obringer, Renee; Nateghi, Roshanak; Maia-Silva, Débora; Mukherjee, Sayanti; CR, Vineeth; McRoberts, D. Brent; Kumar, Rohini

doi:10.1029/2021ef002434

Cited by 43 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…AC is currently one of the most widely available technologies to adapt to extreme heat by increasing thermal comfort and has been shown to be an influential factor in reducing heat-related mortality and improvements in workplace productivity ( 16 , 14 ). It should be noted, however, that reliance on AC has simultaneously been shown to have important consequences for future electricity demand ( 40 ), the stability of the electric grid ( 41 ) (especially during heat waves), and anthropogenic heat fluxes ( 42 ). While alternative individual-level strategies for cooling such as increased ventilation and the use of electric fans have lower greenhouse gas emissions than AC, they may not be sufficient to offset physiological heat strain at high temperature extremes and are less effective amongst vulnerable groups such as older individuals ( 43 , 14 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inequality in the availability of residential air conditioning across 115 US metropolitan areas

et al. 2022

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Continued climate change is increasing the frequency, severity, and duration of populations' high temperature exposures. Indoor cooling is a key adaptation, especially in urban areas, where heat extremes are intensified—the urban heat island effect (UHI)—making residential air conditioning (AC) availability critical to protecting human health. In the United States (U.S.), the differences in residential AC prevalence from one metropolitan area to another is well understood, but its intra-urban variation is poorly characterized, obscuring neighborhood-scale variability in populations’ heat vulnerability and adaptive capacity. We address this gap by constructing empirically derived probabilities of residential AC for 45,995 census tracts across 115 metropolitan areas. Within cities, AC is unequally distributed, with census tracts in the urban ‘core’ exhibiting systematically lower prevalence than their suburban counterparts. Moreover, this disparity correlates strongly with multiple indicators of social vulnerability and summer daytime surface UHI intensity, highlighting the challenges that vulnerable urban populations face in adapting to climate-change driven heat stress amplification.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inequality in the availability of residential air conditioning across 115 US metropolitan areas

et al. 2022

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“…It is important for policy makers and decision makers to consider the potential impacts of population growth and take steps to manage and sustainably develop the region. For instance, population growth and rising temperatures are both expected to increase the demand for air conditioning (Obringer et al, 2022), which can further exacerbate heat stress events if increased energy demands are not met. This lack of access to air conditioning was a mortality factor during the 1999 Chicago heat wave (Naughton et al, 2002).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It can also affect tourism, as high heat stress can make outdoor activities unpleasant and can lead to the closure of beaches and other attractions (Matthews et al, 2021). Additionally, warming can put a strain on the region's energy infrastructure, as increased air conditioning use can lead to higher demand for electricity (Obringer et al, 2022;Tan et al, 2022).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Future population-adjusted heat stress extremes over the Great Lakes Region

Chakraborty

Wang

Yang

et al. 2023

Preprint

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There are large uncertainties in our future projections of climate change at the regional scale, with spatial variabilities not resolved adequately by coarse-grained Earth System Models (ESMs). In this study, we use pseudo global warming simulations driven by end of the century upper end RCP (Representative Concentration Pathway) 8.5 projections from 11 state-of-the-art ESMs to examine changes in summer heat stress extremes using physiologically relevant heat stress metrics (heat index and wet bulb globe temperature) over the Great Lakes Region (GLR). These simulations, generated from a cloud-resolving model, are at a fine spatiotemporal resolution to detect heterogeneities relevant for human heat exposure. These downscaled climate projections are combined with gridded future population estimates to isolate population versus warming contributions to population-adjusted heat stress in this region. Our results show that a significant portion of summer will be dominated by critical outdoor heat stress levels within GLR for this scenario. Additionally, regions with higher heat stress generally have disproportionately higher population densities. Humidity change generates positive feedback on future heat stress, generally amplifying heat stress (by 24.2% to 79.5%) compared to changing air temperature alone, with the degree of control of humidity depending on the heat stress metric used. The uncertainty of the results for future heat stress are quantified based on multiple ESMs and heat stress metrics used in this study. Overall, our study shows the importance of dynamically resolving heat stress at population-relevant scales to get more accurate estimates of future heat risk in the region.

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“…Heat stress, a physiological response to extreme humid heat conditions that limit the body's ability to regulate temperature, depends on a combination of both temperature and humidity, among other factors [1,10,[19][20][21][22][23]. Despite studies showing cooling demand is impacted by humidity conditions as well as temperature [24][25][26][27], most research to date uses temperature-derived variables as the only climate indicators in predicting electricity demand [7,[28][29][30][31]. Because of the proven link between humid heat and energy demand, it is likely that humidity levels impact both AC ownership and patterns of adoption.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Investigating whether the inclusion of humid heat metrics improves estimates of AC penetration rates: a case study of Southern California

Peplinski,

Kalmus,

Sanders

2023

Environ. Res. Lett.

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Global cooling capacity is expected to triple by 2050, as rising temperatures and humidity levels intensify the heat stress that populations experience. Although air conditioning (AC) is a key adaptation tool for reducing exposure to extreme heat, we currently have a limited understanding of patterns of AC ownership. Developing high resolution estimates of AC ownership is critical for identifying communities vulnerable to extreme heat and for informing future electricity system investments as increases in cooling demand will exacerbate strain placed on aging power systems.In this study, we utilize a segmented linear regression model to identify AC ownership across Southern California by investigating the relationship between daily household electricity usage and a variety of humid heat metrics for 200,000 homes. We hypothesize that AC penetration rate estimates, i.e., the percentage of homes in a defined area that have AC, can be improved by considering indices that incorporate humidity as well as temperature. We run the model for each household with each unique metric for the years 2015 and 2016 and compare differences in AC ownership estimates at the census tract level. In total, 81% of the households were identified as having AC by at least one heat metric while 69% of the homes were determined to have AC with a consensus across all five of the heat metrics. Regression results also showed that the r2 values for the dry bulb temperature (0.39) regression were either comparable to or higher than the r2 values for humid heat metrics (0.15-0.40). Our results suggest that using a combination of heat metrics can increase confidence in AC penetration rate estimates, but using dry bulb temperature alone produces similar estimates to other humid heat metrics, which are often more difficult to access, individually. Future work should investigate these results in regions with high humidity.

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Implications of Increasing Household Air Conditioning Use Across the United States Under a Warming Climate

Cited by 43 publications

References 52 publications

Inequality in the availability of residential air conditioning across 115 US metropolitan areas

Inequality in the availability of residential air conditioning across 115 US metropolitan areas

Future population-adjusted heat stress extremes over the Great Lakes Region

Investigating whether the inclusion of humid heat metrics improves estimates of AC penetration rates: a case study of Southern California

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