Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – Air conditioning or air conditioning is said to be a significant trigger for global warming. This is because electronic devices use a lot of energy, which means they contribute to climate change.
As reported by CNBC International, currently, AC is responsible for nearly 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to an analysis by scientists from the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and the Palo Alto Xerox Research Center (Xerox PARC) released in March. .
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“The emissions are expected to get worse as more people install air conditioning, especially in India, China and Indonesia,” said a joint statement from NREL and Xerox PARC quoted on Sunday, (31/7/2022).
“This is both a good thing and a bad thing. It’s good that more people could benefit from increased comfort, but it also means more energy used, and increased carbon emissions,” said NREL senior research engineer Jason Woods.
Conventional air conditioning technology uses a vapor compression cycle to cool the air. In this system, refrigerant is used for cooling.
Chlorofluorocarbons and hydrochlorofluorocarbons used to be part of the most common refrigerants in air conditioners, but these chemicals are depleting the ozone layer and starting to be removed. So far, there are alternatives that do not damage the ozone layer, but still have a high global warming potential.
In addition, a lot of energy in conventional air conditioners is used to excessively cool the air to make it less humid and more comfortable.
“Of the 1,950 million tons of carbon dioxide released annually from the energy used to power air conditioners, 531 million of that is to cool the air and 599 million tons to remove moisture.” added the results of the NREL research.
“We’ve made existing century-old technology nearly as efficient as possible. To get a transformational change in efficiency, we need to look at a different approach without existing limitations,” Woods said.
Meanwhile, to answer this problem, world billionaire Bill Gates also intervened. He provided investment funds to efficient AC technology startup, Blue Frontier, worth US$ 20 million through his company, Breakthrough Energy Ventures.
Blue Frontier itself admits it is currently working on technology that will make air conditioners more efficient with fewer harmful environmental byproducts. So far, the company has managed to use one-third to one-fifth of the amount of refrigerant required for conventional systems.
“The combined effect is an 85% to 87% reduction in our system’s contribution to global warming,” CEO Daniel Betts told CNBC.
Global warming has become a global problem that has been under the spotlight recently after Covid-19. The reason is, several countries in the world have been hit by a deadly heat wave.
Not only that, the increasing number of liquid ice sheets at the poles due to climate change has threatened several small island countries.
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