Stan Cox’s latest essay takes on the ubiquity of air conditioning and its effects on the environment. Cox argues that the benefits of A.C. may not outweigh the long-term economic and environmental costs of keeping, say, North Carolinians chilled to an even 72 or 74 degrees during a sticky August afternoon. At the same time, I don’t know many people living in the south (or even up north in urban and semi-urban areas) who would be willing to sweat it out like Americans did circa 1865.

Cox argues that “stepping from a torrid parking lot into a 72-degree, air-conditioned lobby can provide a degree of instantaneous relief and physical pleasure experienced through few other legal means. But if the effect of air-conditioning on a hot human being can be compared to that of a pain-relieving drug, its economic impact is more like that of an anabolic steroid. And withdrawal, when it comes, will be painful, as some would have experienced from statins. We’re as committed to air-conditioning as we are to cars and computer chips. And a device lucky enough to become indispensable can demand and get whatever it needs to keep running. For the air-conditioner, that’s a lot.”

Perhaps a better alternative would be to find ways of creating and sustaining alternative energy sources to keep folks cool. If you look at the recent growth figures/Census data and look at the geographic shifts that are taking place in the US, people are moving from the northeastern US to the southeastern and southwestern US in record numbers.

These are places (like Tucson, Mesa, El Paso, Baton Rouge, Jackson, Atlanta, Tampa) that, dare I say, are somewhat inhospitable for several months out of the year due to their extreme heat and/or humidity. The policy questions that emerge from a debate about the future of air conditioning and the extent to which folks should/should not use it (or use it as frequently as they do) are quite complex, and definitely deserve our critical attention.