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Sustainable Cooling That Doesn’t Warm the Planet | Rachel Kyte | TED Countdown

“The way we cool things down is heating the planet even more,” says sustainable development expert Rachel Kyte — and the solutions go well beyond just fixing air-conditioning. She identifies four major areas with transformative solutions — from roofs painted with bright white paint to solar control glass to more efficient cold chains for vaccines…

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“The way we cool things down is heating the planet even more,” says sustainable development expert Rachel Kyte — and the solutions go well beyond just fixing air-conditioning. She identifies four major areas with transformative solutions — from roofs painted with bright white paint to solar control glass to more efficient cold chains for vaccines — that can be implemented in fair and sustainable ways. Learn more about what a community designed for cool could look like.

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50 Comments

50 Comments

  1. Scott Henrie

    March 10, 2022 at 8:03 pm

    Our great great grandchildren will be hearing about this topic for their entire life. We’re not even in the *climate optimum!*

    • Rick Dworsky

      March 10, 2022 at 8:08 pm

      climate optimum? not an option… perhaps you meant to say that’s just silly climate opium…

  2. Randall T

    March 10, 2022 at 8:04 pm

    Lmao ok. This lady doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

    • Rick Dworsky

      March 10, 2022 at 8:14 pm

      So, You do? But you don’t offer the slightest clue to the hidden brilliance of your fantastic omnipotent magnificence…

    • Darth Binks

      March 10, 2022 at 8:19 pm

      @ Randall T , please then share with us why she has no clue and your solution then

    • tootsie4445

      March 10, 2022 at 8:45 pm

      Since you obviously have 20+ years of experience in this field, what are your suggestions?

    • Jonathan Coates

      March 10, 2022 at 11:48 pm

      There has been solar powered refrigerator units for decades now. The same technology that was used in early gas (not gasoline) refrigeration. The absorption cycle using ammonia works, is lo-tech and CFC free. This tech is out there and this lecture doesn’t deserve to be a Ted video.

  3. aceklankb

    March 10, 2022 at 8:04 pm

    Drop shaved ice from giant airplanes all over the world, Voila!

  4. Scot Fretwell

    March 10, 2022 at 8:10 pm

    No point to saving the planet if only the wealthy can afford to live here guy.

    • Zenn Exile

      March 10, 2022 at 8:51 pm

      we could just eat them and everyone could afford to live just fine off the land like we’re supposed to anyway

    • Graham Quigley

      March 10, 2022 at 8:55 pm

      @Zenn Exile ★彡★十 ① ⑦②⑦⑦⑤⑤⑤⑥⑥③★彡★🇱🇷彡★Yes link up with him and remember to share your experience with others

    • Graham Quigley

      March 10, 2022 at 8:55 pm

      I’m no longer waiting for the GRANT LOAN because I earn $24,600 every 10 days recently

  5. Zenn Exile

    March 10, 2022 at 8:17 pm

    The carbon footprint is mainly Agriculture. And I don’t mean cows, I mean all of it. Fossil fuel energy could be eliminated at the click of COMMENT on this post and we’d still be rapidly approaching 1.5C, nothing in this presentation is helpful to reducing the levels of carbon in the atmosphere. Absolutely nothing. This is corporate propaganda designed to sell more of the problem at a premium rate.

  6. Rick Dworsky

    March 10, 2022 at 8:30 pm

    First we have to overcome the internal resistance of ignorant saps stuck and clinging to their obsolete, destructive, unhealthy ways of life. Social engineering is much more difficult than the dreamy simplicity of engineering efficient machines. Give Life a Chance ~ Go Vegan!

  7. Diet Pizza

    March 10, 2022 at 8:31 pm

    Step 1: create crazy-advanced technology, Step 2: party

    • Brokkoli OMG

      March 11, 2022 at 10:32 am

      A silver bullet solution exists in almost no area where we have problems. We need to work on a lot of factors, to make it systemically better. I think this was presented here in a well made way.

    • Diet Pizza

      March 11, 2022 at 7:44 pm

      @Brokkoli OMG everyone just brushes past the “make technology that doesn’t exist” part so casually

    • Brokkoli OMG

      March 11, 2022 at 9:13 pm

      @Diet Pizza I dont get your point. This is not only about technology that doesn’t exist yet. Even if we were only talking about that, we can get there, when the engineers of such companies focus on getting to a more efficient tech. It’s not crazy stuff, we have been making things more efficient all the time.

  8. Gaasuba Meskhenet

    March 10, 2022 at 8:35 pm

    my lords keep cutting down our insulating trees and bushes!!!!! give people the power to have a say in how their homes are renovated. no more evictions from primary properties!

  9. Rahul Chanana

    March 10, 2022 at 9:04 pm

    29°C is not even considered warm in India

    • TheMagicJIZZ

      March 11, 2022 at 3:41 am

      its hotter than india. uk in the summer is extremely hot and humid. the uk has the gulf stream so it feels way more painful

    • Hemant Dwivedi

      March 11, 2022 at 4:10 am

      Uk deserve it bro …

    • Rahul Chanana

      March 11, 2022 at 5:03 am

      @TheMagicJIZZ It gets upto 45°C in India

    • JustSen

      March 11, 2022 at 7:16 am

      @Rahul Chanana And the lowest? According to Google it’s been lowest around 15°C. If you live in India let me ask you this, do you walk around in t-shirt and shorts in those temperatures? 15°C is when I am comfortable with t-shirts and shorts while anything above 25°C is hot. Anything below 0°C is chilly and under -10°C gets cold.

      I work in building maintenance which includes ventilation/heating and cooling in a nordic country and I’ve met people from “hot” countries like India that have moved here for work and they’re complaining about a cold working environment in an office even when it’s been 25°C indoors and I’m sweating like crazy in t-shirt while they’ve been wearing long sleeves and sometimes even jackets.

      So I’ve come under the assumption that human body adjusts over time to the climate they live in. And since from -25°C to +30°C is nearly a 50°C change in temperatures 30°C is pretty damn hot from our point of view.

    • Rahul Chanana

      March 11, 2022 at 7:39 am

      @JustSen The temp range in Amritsar, India where I live is from 2°C in winters to 45°C in summers, still we don’t use any kind of active cooling/heating, only passive insulation. Get your facts straight.

  10. Rishi Kejrewal

    March 10, 2022 at 9:09 pm

    And I was hoping for some genuine answers from this video 😒

  11. sjoerd woudaa

    March 10, 2022 at 9:18 pm

    Dream on

  12. step by step

    March 10, 2022 at 9:28 pm

    theoritical talk not practical solutions here and thats make me more disperate we r all dead

  13. Barboron

    March 10, 2022 at 9:47 pm

    Sustainable cooling by more efficient cooling….doing ANY sort of work produces heat as ‘waste’ energy. Does she not understand the second law of thermodynamics?
    She’s just stating a bunch of ideals without how to actually do anything.

    Then she goes off about vaccine distribution. What is wrong with this woman?

  14. CMDR After Hours

    March 10, 2022 at 9:56 pm

    Friendly reminder brothers and sisters. We don’t live on a planet and the “global warming” is another psyop. Thanks.

  15. H-Ch

    March 10, 2022 at 9:57 pm

    The French company “Leviathan Dynamics” is developping a cooling system that is using water instead of HFC as a refrigerant, it is also using 30% less energy than traditional air cooling systems.

  16. m

    March 10, 2022 at 10:35 pm

    2:15 That’s the problem, the people who are responsible for causing most of the heating, as well as the people in charge of making policies are always rich people who have heaters and air-conditions in their homes, cars, offices, clothes, etc. so they never have to feel the effects of the cold or heat they are causing or responsible for ameliorating. Maybe if they could feel it, they could relate the plight of everybody else and be more amenable to dealing with it. 😒

    • kalidesu

      March 10, 2022 at 11:42 pm

      Your not very smart are you, just another second hand Greta climate change socialist. ohh it’s derr rich peoplesss der…

    • Lane Atkinson

      March 11, 2022 at 1:10 am

      @kalidesu Poor people can’t afford to waste heating or cooling, most can’t afford it at all. When people can afford to waste resources, they don’t put in nearly as much effort in conserving those resources.

  17. Steve Muratore

    March 10, 2022 at 11:18 pm

    What’s a coal chain?

    • Sai Kiran Avala

      March 10, 2022 at 11:27 pm

      It’s not coal , it’s a cold chain. A way of transportation of goods where the items in cargo need to be maintained below a certain temperature.

  18. Toni

    March 10, 2022 at 11:57 pm

    It strikes me as rather amusing that suddenly the air conditioner has become the villain when no one complained about the heater. I have three air conditioners that never get switched on, and at the same time, in winter I shivver because I don’t have a heater.

  19. Toni

    March 11, 2022 at 12:01 am

    China: The largest producer of everything, does it on coal. Japan has 56 nuclear power plants. Is that the way we should go?

  20. gavazzfromoz

    March 11, 2022 at 12:56 am

    Rudolf diesel design the engine to run on plant oils. Hemp oil 30 barrels to 1 acre. It a weed no fertilizer needed. Get out of the Rockefeller night mare

  21. جلال باسم فاضل يونس

    March 11, 2022 at 3:01 am

    أكو عرب بالطيارة ؟😂😂

  22. جلال باسم فاضل يونس

    March 11, 2022 at 3:02 am

    تحية من العراق الجريح للعربيين

  23. John Strawb

    March 11, 2022 at 4:27 am

    This is largely foolishness. Simply superinsulating all new housing, reinsulating older housing, insulated shutters, and instituting inexpensive energy recovery ventilators and whole house fans will cut cooling AND heating use and costs by 80-90%.

    Most solutions are far lower tech than you think. Simply putting awnings over windows will accomplish the improvements on energy use you discuss.

    • crappymeal

      March 11, 2022 at 1:54 pm

      nobody can be bothered or cares unfortunately

  24. timothy haley

    March 11, 2022 at 4:42 am

    Why are HFC bad now. They were awesome 10 years ago.

  25. Unscented Napalm

    March 11, 2022 at 10:22 am

    A great lesson in “How to talk for 10 minutes without saying anything.”

    • crappymeal

      March 11, 2022 at 1:55 pm

      i learnt quite a bit from it

  26. crappymeal

    March 11, 2022 at 2:03 pm

    the technology and techniques exist we just need to change our social structures with open source government or something similar

  27. john go

    March 11, 2022 at 3:17 pm

    NATO said 16,000 volunteers to fight Russia, sorry? To defend Ukraine! ? And the Russian state said: “Do we allow 16,000 volunteers to enter the battle?” same Number!!! Agents of both sides are talking about biological and semi-nuclear attacks, and unfortunately, in 2 to 3 weeks we’ll see some of those pictures mentioning a fireball.

  28. Axel Werner

    March 11, 2022 at 3:43 pm

    If all you have is a simple fan and water, just put a large wet towel on your shoulders or back and let it dry. within minutes it will cool your body very nicely for low cost. works even better when combined with a fan.

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