The first image is telling: A glass building in front of a white hard-floor plaza with just one small tree for shade

Nothing specific to the European commission though, we just don't hate mainstream architects enough

It would burn less, if not all these abstract architects would sit in old art nouveau buildings near a park, with the AC tastefully hidden in the backyard - and there they sit on the MAC, shitting out these etched waver under the ERM buildings and cities for the rest of us to be miserable in.

> The heat wave has prompted a renewed discussion about the lack of air-conditioning systems in homes and offices across much of Europe

Discussion, common sense requires discussion. All you need to know about them in one sentence.

Most ordinary working people can't afford the cost of installing a system. Even a portable one.

It's not that expensive. There are other reasons why people can't install one in Europe than money. Mostly for people living in apartments. In an apartment building you need the approval of other apartment owners to "modify the building facade". And some people have terrible neighbors. Another thing that happens in Europe is that if the building is 100+ years old, it's facade may be protected as a "historic building" and then you need another approval from some bureaucrats which are responsible for protecting historic buildings. And of course if you're renting, you need to convince your landlord if you want a proper AC not a portable one.

> Most ordinary working people can't afford the cost of installing a system. Even a portable one.

I just watched a video where a person bought a £200 portable unit. He was using it in the UK and said he spent about £0.89 / day. And I'm assuming they won't use it for that many days a year.

Seems affordable enough for "most ordinary working people"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOmzVWTH3xo

A 12K BTU mini-split system is about 300EUR. How is this unaffordable for most people? Even an 18K unit is about 500-600EUR.

Realistically a decent mini-split that won't break in a year and won't make too much noise starts at ~€600-800 + €400 installation in a low-labor-cost country (Latvia), in high-labor-cost countries such as Germany the installation bit might be twice-thrice as expensive.

Something is very wrong with the EU if ordinary Europeans can't afford a $150 window unit.

Sounds good! It was a waste to begin with. They can handle first-class.

What are you on about. They are not expensive at all. What they can't afford is to pay the electrical bill of running one.

My multisplit system costs <€60 a month to run even during the hottest months, which is way below heating costs during winter. And that's keeping entire apartment at constant 22ºC - people with higher "comfort temperature" can keep the bill significantly lower.

unless they also come w/ rooftop solar?

new mini splits are way more efficient than older systems as well.

insulation in older homes/buildings might be an issue though

Ironically- while often having solar on the roof.

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

This is a reference to Animal Farm, right?

This exact quote ran through my mind and I was tempted to post it.

"A third staffer working on the 8th floor told POLITICO on Friday that even with working AC, the temperature inside was still 25.7 degrees."

So 78F. I wonder what temp the lower floors are at. It's reasonable if they want to prevent the upper floors from becoming non-survivable, since hot air rises.

With new inexpensive mini splits that do not require ducts, one would think adoption would go up?

wow that’s an ugly look.

Kinda weird though even for Europe that a high profile 10+ floor commercial building doesn’t have suitable climate control

Reminds me of Animal Farm.

Imagine offices- who have temperatures of 30+ directly beneath the roof. AC where the heat-exchangers are built inside the buildings and other nonsense on top. Europe is so not ready, while preaching to the world about getting ready.

And all of those Europeans that had comments about the Texas ERCOT warnings of heavy loads during extreme weather. Although, it's been a while since I've received notices/requests to adjust the use even if they were bump it up a few degrees vs turn it off.

Except it wasn't the basement and first floor.

It was the first seven floors. Coincidentally, also the floors most of the higher-ups don't work on. Or at least that's how it's being reported, so I don't think people's outrage is absurd.

Up vs down, always. Not surprising in the least.

Related and a little ironic: houses in northern Europe nowadays typically have "AC" in the form of air-to-air heat pumps that both can heat and cool. Houses in southern and central Europe dramatically lag behind in terms of adoption.

> Due to extreme weather conditions, forced shut down of air cooling system from floor 1 to 7 for the rest of the day

It's like satire. What is AC for if not extreme heat?

When there is not enough AC, people sweat. It’s better for half to sweat to death so the other half can remain frosty.

Historically temperatures above 30C (86F) were rare in Europe, so thats what many ACs are sized for. Now they face 40C (104F), and many AC installations can't keep up

Shutting down AC on floors 1 to 7 likely allows them to get better performance on floors 8 to 13

Normal day to day cooling, I mean, obviously? Like if you have a system designed to operate in 25-30C(normal summer in most of Europe) but then you have a spike of temperatures going to 40C for a few days in a row, it shouldn't really be a surprise the system doesn't work in conditions it wasn't designed for? The compressor overheats and shuts down, especially if it wasn't installed in the shade.

Just like heat pumps for heating in winter are amazing for our regular mild-ish winters, but if you get a really cold spell and it drops to -35C, it's just not going to work at all to a point where it might not even start - you could also say "well what's the point of a heating system that can't heat in extreme cold".

The extreme is the keyword.

Why the fuck does extreme heat require turning off the AC?

The A/C cannot keep up the load, due to the exteme heat. So they decided to just not cool one part of the building, to be able to keep cooling the other part .. It is now interesting who was in which part ;)

The article indicates they were unable to handle the increased electricity load, which caused blackouts.

Additionally, sometimes unnaturally high temperatures break AC systems put in place with poor planning. This is very common in UK supermarkets every summer.

> unnaturally high temperatures

> poor planning.

> very common in UK supermarkets every summer.

What?

Global warming keeps making the temperature unnaturaly high, don't tell me you didn't hear about it.

my guess is that the outdoor AC unit reached its maximum working temperature...

since we're not that used to extreme heat in EU, units with max working temperatures of 45 degrees Celsius are pretty common and the air around the AC unit is warmer than regular outdoors air, doubly so if they're placed on the ground and the glass from the building reflects some additional heat from the sun.

the risk of this was broadcasted in our local news for home AC owners when the forecast reached 40, as lots of apartments have the AC on partly glass-encased balconies, or on walls facing direct sunlight...

Based on the little information provided the AC can't keep up. So they cut off the lower half of the building to provide better cooling to the other half

Which, as heat rises, is probably reasonable.

Seems like power shortages:

>”The European Parliament has also faced blackouts this week due to energy consumption from cranking up its cooling system.”

Presumably the AC systems themselves couldn't operate in that extreme heat. A lot of grocery stores in the UK, which are icy cold usually, had major issues with AC and refrigeration systems failing - I think because a lot of the equipment is on the roof and exposed to the heat.

Its pretty common to se the AC systems on the top of roofs on big buildings in the US. From what I read, exposing the AC condenser unit to the sun should have minimal impact. Air flow through the condenser unit matters the most. Perhaps they were undersized for the extreme heat now happening in the UK.

AC systems don't quite care about direct sunlight, they are forced air heat exchangers. Now if the condenser (rooftop) side is undersized and therefore inadequate given elevated ambient air temperature all you can do is shut down a portion of evaporation side (the cold one) off, or the entire system just stops working.

Alternatively one can install water sprinkers on roofs like they do in China.