- The environmental degradation witnessed around the globe has wrought havoc on the hitherto established weather patterns is stating the obvious. The erratic weather patterns have become a norm, leading to unseasonal rains, snow, storms, famine, drought, and last but not least, steadily increasing heat phenomena worldwide. The steady rise in temperature in the last few decades has simply placed humankind at great discomfiture. The cascading effect of this is that none of the economies, big or small, are left unaffected by the environmental degradation, posing existential challenges. The battle has just begun, and humanity will have to devise suitable measures to combat Mother Nature to ensure less unpleasantness in the future.
- Of course, India as a country too is not spared of the weather vagaries, and the growing incidents of erratic patterns have made the authorities wake up and act without any further delay. India is notoriously known for heat and dust at the best of times. The increasingly erratic weather patterns have only made the situation worse. As the heat index rises, India must do both active and passive cooling much better, for Indians to flourish. The planet is getting hotter. As reports suggest, the average surface temperature in 2024 was the highest on record. But temperature is one thing, felt heat, another. No thanks to humidity, in cities like Delhi and Hyderabad, the real feel temperature can be 10 degrees Celsius higher than what thermometers show.
- This is nothing but the heat index. And as it climbs, so does power consumption. Industry voices say demand for ACs has doubled in four years. NFHS 5 found that 40% of urban and 16% of rural households have an AC/cooler. The rest are restrained by the affordability barrier. And yet, the let everybody have cake kind of solution is no solution at all. It’s well known that more ACs mean more heat island effect. Thus, we need to undertake a big picture revision of both active and passive cooling. The first is a hard technology matter. For example, with an estimated third of AC electricity use going to remove moisture, a US startup is working on metal-organic frameworks that do much more energy-efficient dehumidification.
PC: Bloomberg News
- Indian engineers need to crack something like this. Window units became affordable in other parts of the world 50 years ahead of us. Why not get ahead of the curve? A wiseman said that air conditioning changed the nature of civilization by making development possible in the tropics. Access to cooling is about having high productivity, good health, and good education. It’s about human flourishing. Not all solutions lie in the future, though. Some lie in our past. Builders should adopt traditional Indian constructions, holding precious knowledge about heat insulation. Think clay tile walls, mud caulking, ventilating, and shading features. The need of the hour is to ensure heat is kept at bay by amalgamating traditional and modern building technologies.
