We sense a small hint of guilt when Rémi Pérony recognizes that, during his stay in India from 2014 to 2017, the first item he rushed to buy was an air conditioner. This engineer by training, specialist in energy and electrical engineering, is obviously aware that this equipment is profoundly harmful for the planet, a real time bomb used to counter the effects of global warming which it also fuels. The very example of a vicious circle.
“Concretely, an air conditioner works like a fridge, schematizes Rémi Pérony. It decompresses and compresses refrigerants, making cold on one side and hot on the other. » However, by rejecting heat outside buildings, it contributes to the warming of cities in summer. As early as 2012, a study by CNRS and Météo France showed that emissions from air conditioners increased the temperature in the streets of Paris by 0.5°C, a figure which could rise to 2°C if the heat emitted were to double. If the use of air conditioners remains much more reasonable in France than in the United States, where 90% of homes have such equipment, their number is also increasing significantly in France. The Environment and Energy Management Agency (Ademe) noted in 2020 that a quarter of households were equipped with an air conditioner, compared to 16% in 2016.
