Guilt-free Comfort

Man has naturally sought comfort inside his dwelling or place of work. Aside from building a protection against the elements, enemies and animals – a house is a place for rest and recreation. Being comfortable gives man security for his physical needs thus allowing him to pursue rather lofty intellectual pursuits like the search for intellect (by discovering things or by trying to explain things) and the aesthetics (art and creativity).

The human body is like any other warm-bloodied organism, vulnerable to temperature changes. It needs a certain warmth or coolness for the organs to be able to operate well and for the body to survive. In warmer tropical countries that are very close to the equator, men search for a little colder.  In the northern hemisphere where there are months when nights are longer, people search for additional warmth.

In the ancient times, it was the bonfire or animal skin. In the modern times, it is air conditioning or air conditioning units. These devices are installed in houses and are either powered by natural gas, by electricity or by firewood – as in the terms of the heaters. These machines could be expensive and use a lot of electricity, but without them, humans could die.

This useful equipment has even been installed in the more mobile vehicles or mobile homes. This equipment allows humans to go on with their daily activities unperturbed by temperature, the weather and the elements. With the world going faster than ever before, men could not allow weather to dictate on their productivity and life in general.

While air cooling machines deliver great services to people, for many years it has also ironically contributed to the warming of the planet. Most of the cooling agents in these machines, called refrigerants or freons used a gaseous compound called chlorofluorocarbons (CFC), which freeze as liquid at low temperature and high pressure, and revert to gas to cool the surrounding air when released to regular atmospheric pressure.

However, this chemical is destructive to the ozone layer, the thick gas that protects the earth from the heat and ultraviolet radiation from the sun. Ozone is basically heavy oxygen or O3 in comparison to the O2 of regular breathing oxygen. When CFC is released into the air, they break the chain of the ozone and chip off one of the oxygen atoms, forcing the O2 to go back to earth and taking away another layer of ozone.

In 2007, close to 200 countries signed the Montreal Protocol, promising to eliminate CFCs as refrigerants and replace it with non-destructive, although slightly expensive alternatives.

Non-destructive air conditioning machines are just one step. There is recent technology that makes these machines consume less power, thus saving on fuel that produces electricity. There is also a recent discovery by a German company that will utilize the power of the sun to produce cool air in the summer and warm air in the winter.

With concern from countries and consumers and the fast production of technology, the ironic life-saving yet environmentally-destroying predicament of the air conditioning machine could be on its last days. Finally, man can now live and work comfortably, thanks to the air conditioning machine, and without the guilt.