Temperatures reach 46C in Spain as Europe heatwave continues
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Maybe because of global warming.
Nah, its because of the gay frogs
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I’m just so tired of people dealing with the climate change as if it was inevitable, like some karma shit. A lot of people just don’t want to change. They want to keep going like they used to and that’s driving me insane.
Climate change is inevitable. Its already here. It can be mitigated, however. Pretending its avoidable is folly.
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A heatwave continues to grip large parts of Europe, with authorities in many countries issuing health warnings amid searing temperatures.
Southern Spain is the worst-affected region, with temperatures in the mid-40s Celsius recorded in Seville and neighbouring areas.
A new heat record for June of 46C was set on Saturday in the town of El Granado, according to Spain's national weather service, which also said this month is on track to be the hottest June on record.
Here's to drinking lots of H2O. At least it's a dry heat. I lose my shit in high humid heat.
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No, we literally cannot safely build a glass dome that big. I do think large blimps with reflective tops could cool a city a little though.
It's possible to protect against heatwaves on a city level. Increase the albedo value of the city by doing the following: Incentivize lighter colored roofing and walls, grow leafy trees for shade, cover parking lots with solar roofing (and add EV chargers). Basically do whatever possible to reduce the amount of asphalt and darkish materials in general, being hit by sunshine.
No it won't save your ass when ambient temperature is 50C, but considering that cities are by their very nature hotter than the ambient temperature out side of the city, these things would help reduce that gap.
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We're very aware in the UK but it's not too easy. We have some the oldest housing stock in the world. We don't have central air with no real way to retrofit so it would have to be one room at a time. Our windows aren't designed to house those units I see in NY. We have to rely on very inefficient portable units so I only use it on the really hot days. Energy prices are still high after Russia's invasion. People are adding proper units when extending but only the rich can really afford that.
For detached houses, you can do split systems with multiple indoor units per one outdoor unit. In a flat, you're a bit more fucked because you might need permission from other people in the building, etc.
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I live in Spain, and since temperatures are now reaching 39°C in my area, I ordered two AC units for the most used rooms in my house (living room and bedroom).
With installation it costed 1300€. A months salary basically. In my area the cheapest unit with installation was 450€, but it didn't look very reliable.
I ordered it 11 days ago, and I'm scheduled to receive it and installed either this week or the next. AC installers are oversaturated with orders this time of the year. It's insane.
I live in Estonia, temperatures don't ever get to 39C but they do get up to 33-34 and for some reason my house gets pretty humid even at high temps, so it's worse inside than outside, even if it's hotter outside. I got a heat pump installed about 2 years ago, cost around 2k installed, but then again I went for a beefy Mitsubishi unit (big house and only one unit for now). It's an absolute game changer in the summer, and in the winter when it gets cold, it saves me effort as well - I have to load the furnace less.
I figure it's already earned its keep via the heating, but also if I do 2 extra hours of productive work 2 days a week, that's 10 weeks of summertime heat till it's paid off in full and while most summers don't come with 10 weeks of heat, every summer has at least 4-5 hot weeks here.
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On the other hand reversible heatpumps work great with floor heating.
Having a cool floor during a heatwave is amazing, plus no noise,
Does that work for ground source heat pumps too? Like could I literally cool my floor with one? For summer and light winter, my air to air unit is fine and air to water is great too, but when it's like -25 or -30 out, the air source units start getting pretty inefficient.
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Well in places like UK, people are installing AC instead of trying many other, passive cooling options first. They don't plant a single shrub next to their building but do put in highly inefficient portable AC units meanwhile asphalting/concreting there driveways... That's exactly what got me on my high horse. AC can be needed, but it's definitely not the first way to go in a northern-ish European place if the building doesn't have outside shutters, very non green streets around etc. It's not the miracle solution, AC adds to climate change, other ways of dealing with heat do not.
I installed triple glazing and started shutting windows during the day, but since there's little ventilation, that means the air gets really bad here eventually. There's trees on the south side of the house and no windows on that wall. I'm further north than the majority of the UK (think between Inverness and Shetland for my latitude - except I'm at the Baltic sea).
The AC is just necessary in the last few years. A decade ago it got hot, but not unbearably. Now it's worse. I think the increased insulation is actually making AC-less, windows-closed situation heat worse since there are no shutters. I do wonder if polarizing film would be an effective alternative, as I don't want it to be dark 24/7 and I'd forget to re-open the shutters when the summer is over lol
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Does that work for ground source heat pumps too? Like could I literally cool my floor with one? For summer and light winter, my air to air unit is fine and air to water is great too, but when it's like -25 or -30 out, the air source units start getting pretty inefficient.
Probably, it should be quite efficient as well.
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It's possible to protect against heatwaves on a city level. Increase the albedo value of the city by doing the following: Incentivize lighter colored roofing and walls, grow leafy trees for shade, cover parking lots with solar roofing (and add EV chargers). Basically do whatever possible to reduce the amount of asphalt and darkish materials in general, being hit by sunshine.
No it won't save your ass when ambient temperature is 50C, but considering that cities are by their very nature hotter than the ambient temperature out side of the city, these things would help reduce that gap.
Trees are good and general greenery too, but then you run into water issues which will be the limiting factor for a lot of stuff going forward as fresh water availability decreases and groundwater runs low.
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Trees are good and general greenery too, but then you run into water issues which will be the limiting factor for a lot of stuff going forward as fresh water availability decreases and groundwater runs low.
Yeah, hoping we can avoid that, but it's not looking too great. It's a mitigation for today's world, but not for the future unless we also manage to solve the water issue. And just global warming in general.
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Women is plural.
Oh yes sorry for the typo
