"The first thing I did after becoming prime minister was to install air conditioners in the buildings where civil servants worked."
Lee Kuan Yew, the "founding father" of Singapore, praised air conditioning as "one of the most important inventions in history" in a 2009 interview, saying it had boosted the efficiency of public administration. Recently, Tesla CEO Elon Musk cited this interview to hail the former prime minister as a "genius."
Singapore's decades-old cooling policy is being revisited because of Europe's record heat wave. Since mid-last month, European countries have been sweltering under a heat wave with highs exceeding 40 degrees Celsius, but casualties are mounting because most homes, schools and hospitals lack air conditioning. Air conditioning penetration stands at 25% in France and 5% in the United Kingdom, no comparison to South Korea (98%) or the United States (90%). This is because government regulations are strict, citing noise, damage to building exteriors and environmental impact, while consumers have also been reluctant to use air conditioning due to concerns over power consumption and environmental awareness. But Europeans have thrown up their hands in the face of increasingly extreme weather. European appliance stores are packed day after day with consumers looking to buy air conditioners.
The spread of air conditioning has now escalated into political conflict. In France in particular, ahead of next year's presidential election, heat wave measures are emerging as a key issue, with the left arguing that "reckless installation will cause even greater harm" and the right countering that "the heat wave is taking lives." Marine Le Pen, former leader of France's far-right National Rally, said that if elected president she would supply air conditioning to hospitals, nursing homes and schools. When some Americans mocked France's shortage of air conditioning, a Paris deputy mayor pushed back, saying that "the United States, the world's second-largest greenhouse gas emitter, bears considerable responsibility for France's damage."
Korea's government froze electricity rates in the second half of the year as a measure against high prices. While worries over cooling costs during the heat wave have eased, there are also concerns that indiscriminate air conditioning use could worsen power shortages and the climate crisis. Whether it is Europe, trapped by ideology and clinging to air conditioning regulations, or Korea, steeped in convenience and passive in responding to global warming, it is time to think deeply about survival strategies for the era of climate change.
