Officials Turn Up Heat on Air Conditioning Scams

SPRING, TX, August 17, 2012 (Press-News.org) As if there aren't enough scams going around, this summer brings one that takes advantage of the high temperatures. Scammers are calling or texting offers promising federal assistance with skyrocketing electric bills. They ask for your social security number and other personal information in exchange for up to $1,000 toward the cost of a new home air conditioner. The worst part of these phishing schemes is that these home subsidies offered are not even set up yet.

The government sets aside billions of dollars annually for low income assistance on heating and cooling bills for the last 30 years. However, certain elements are not equally covered since about 90% of this budget is spent during the winter. So if you're freezing, you don't need that extra blanket, but if you're having a heat stroke, you're out of luck. Eighty-seven percent of U.S. homes have AC but still are viewed with prejudice that so many and so much use of air conditioners may result in aiding a possible climate crisis.

One former head of UN ozone program actually compared AC consumption to that of fatty foods, calling it a dangerous luxury making us soft in spirit and flesh. Others blame air conditioning for rising obesity rates as well but without any evidence. Some people just jump on the idea that maybe overcooling could be just another American addiction like overeating or overspending. Some Americans view air conditioning as a stand-in for everything wrong in the world. Why is it okay to get extra heat, but shameful to need more cooling?

The country has endured some record high temperatures already this summer & it's not over yet. It seems that avoiding the heat may be adding to the problem. Research has shown that all over air conditioning of buildings and cars emits about 500 millions tons of carbon-dioxide annually.

These huge numerical statistics are hard to ignore when air conditioners have become so much more popular. One should know that they are no worse than heaters though, possibly even less harmful. It has been proven that we use more energy to heat homes than to cool them, by about 5 times the BTU's and about 2 and a half times the cost. Even after so many people have moved toward the southern and coastal areas, there is actually a decline in energy use for climate control. The extra demand has been made for icy shopping centers but that is offset by less use of oil and gas based heating.

Statistics from a few years ago show that northerners are emitting 20-25 percent more carbon dioxide from their heaters than Southerners with air conditioning units. Older refrigerants used in household appliances do emit HFC's which are a contributor to global warming, but these are being phased out. These still only make up about a quarter of the green house emissions associated with air conditioning.

When people argue that it is more important to have heat than air conditioning, that you can just open a window or turn on a fan, what about the hundreds of people that day each year from heat stroke? Personally I believe it is easier to throw on an extra blanket and get warm than it is to get cool. Even if you open a window or turn on a fan, you're letting in and blowing around more hot air. You can put on enough to get warm but you cannot take off enough to get cool.

Maybe it's just that being hot doesn't "hurt' as much as being cold. Pain researcher Jeff Mogil of McGill University says that warm temperatures applied to skin goes from just unpleasant to outright painful within just 2.5 degrees but for cold it happens over a 10 degree span. This looks like heat is actually worse. Mogil thinks that cold is worse though since it starts to get unpleasant sooner and has a greater range of unpleasant temperatures.

Even if cold is more unpleasant than hot on a per degree basis, it still does not make it more reasonable to crank the heat and forgo AC. Many places have such weather extremes that they can be deadly, so one should not judge the other so harshly. If you want to save one, both should be saved. Or if you want to sacrifice one, both should be sacrificed equally. Personally, I prefer cuddling up with an extra blanket in the winter, but I most assuredly will indulge in my air conditioning during these brutal Houston summer months.

Air National of Houston is a service-oriented provider of residential and commercial Air Conditioning and Heating systems. For more information, please contact us at (281) 251-3143.

Website: http://www.AirNationalHouston.com