It's OK for you lot that live within Nor'Easter distance of the Beach. Cool breeze every afternoon & night. Our first AC was in the 80's when we cared for a sick old lady. Now we're in our 80's we love it & will use as much as we can afford. In any case we are still pushed to buy as many electric consuming appliances as we can fit in our homes. If it's so bad then the Gov should take them off the market.

Jeff, us birds living west of Hexham need all the cooling we can get. I jump into the pool as much as possable but that doesn't cool the house down. Since our electricity suppler placed us on a " smart meter system" ( we didn't ask for it)we have tried to run any power consuming appliance in the off peak period were we pay 8.14 cents per kWh.This included the pool pump that's set to run from 4:30am till 7am. The ducted air con will run today in the peak period due to temp near 40 degrees. Cost is 35.6 cent per kWh which will hurt but it's better than a mutiny in the house. I will say that the last bill was half conpared to last years at the same time.

I think clothes dryers and dish washers should also be on the list. These are hardly esssential items and chew up considerable power when used. There is nothing inherently wrong with use of an airconditioner, if its done sparingly and efficiently. My mid 80s mother has one and uses a ceiling fan on most occassions. Its only when temperatures soar into the 40s and there is no cooling sea breeze she turns it on for a short period, ensuring to only cool the area she is using by closing doors and windows. Misuse and people not knowing how to get the best from their aircon is a contibutimg factor. More education should be forthcoming. As you can't stop people using them educate to get the best from them.

Only trouble with that idea is it will create another breed of bureaucrats to look after the process. Each house is dfferent in size. design and number of occupants so would have to be audited to determine the amount of electricity required. This would create the need for many tiers of bureaucracy and, if our state gov is anything to go by, many tiers of corruption to go along with it. The bribes would flow freely and along with the exorbidant saleries paid to upper management as well as the overseas junkets or "study tours" it would end up costing the taxpayer a fortune and create it's own huge carbon footprint which would in turn have to be balanced with an increase in the energy tax. Either that or we go communist.

Not here Jeff, there is a split system on the wall that has never worked since day dot of living here as a renter of the property. There is actually a real good deal at homeart at the moment. It's a reverse Cycle air conditioner with no installation required as it is movable to other rooms and has dehumidifying functions. It was worth $599, but now on sale for $399..... Worth the look Jeff, especially in this heat ! Tell them you need to feel what the air con feels like and if it up to your standard, that usually takes 20 minutes in this weather for me to move out of the front of it ! Jeff now you know something about air conditioners, tell Newcastle Courthouse about it Diddums !!! pmsl

we have air conditioning at our place but we barely use it, only when the heat is intolerable. to save money and electricity we close the entire house and have drapes that block out all heat. its great!!!if ppl can do that, it can save a ton of money and help the environment out.

Jeff I think the real problem is the poorly designed housing that requires air conditioning. If we were to consider how to design our houses better to suit the climate we live in, rather the just throwing up brick veneer, tile clad look-a-like it would go a long way to helping the problem. Most of these houses today give little thought to natural ventilation which in turn make air conditioning a far more attractive option. To design our homes in a more environmental responsive way would greatly reduce the need for air-con. And to design in this way does not require more money just more thought.

Imagine that the entire world economy consists of 2 small islands, a canoe ride apart. Each island has 10 men & 10 women, & can support each community's requirements for food & shelter. How does each community decide what to spend time doing? Catching fish? Building canoes? Making pointed sticks in case the other mob invades? And how to share the spoils : equally? Or in proportion to effort and output? Are fish catchers worth more than pointy stick makers? Probably, until the other island invades! Should each little community somehow decide (and occasionally review) what it wants, in terms of activity, productivity, & output, & move ahead on that basis? Of course! That's called "the market". The collective desires, hopes, aspirations, requirements of the community. We all want comfortable lifestyles : plasma tv's, a/c, cars, nice food, leisure. More recently, we all want to save the planet as well. The best mechanism for influencing these decisions is price (or cost). If cigarettes cost $100 a pack, how many people would smoke? Few. If energy tripled in cost, how do we use/buy aircon? Sparingly. At present, the community is saying it accepts cheap energy and a/c. That will change.

Jeff you could also apply this thought process on a macro level; do we, a first world country have the right to suck up all the worlds resources ignoring the countries that can't afford to? We as consumers seem to have no problem buying cheap products made with child labour.... etc. etc. Now in saying that, I live in a home that was made for hot days, it has high ceilings verandah around most of the house and wide eaves round the rest, it has good ventilation under the house too. And we live close enough to the coast to get the sea breeze. So we don't have an air con, even though on those 40+ degree days I wish we had one. However if I lived in Maitland or further out, yes I would have an air con, because they get a higher number of unbearably hot days than us lucky enough to live by the coast. Maybe people need to think about turning their appliances off at the wall when not in use. I just watched a cool video on the net about consumerism it goes for 20 mins and kids could watch and understand. I think it aligns with todays blog. Here it is: http://www.storyofstuff.com/

Not much good without proper insulation you can't air condition the world.