European soccer fans have descended on the United States for the World Cup in recent weeks, and many are discovering a simple American luxury that remains frustratingly elusive back home: reliable air conditioning.
In packed stadiums and hotels from coast to coast, they enjoy cool, comfortable environments even as temperatures climb. In Europe, by contrast, governments steeped in net-zero dogma continue to treat air conditioning as an environmental sin rather than the century-old, life-saving technology it is.
Recent heatwaves have highlighted the human cost. In France, temperatures soared above 40°C (104°F) in June, prompting thousands of Parisians to seek relief by jumping into the city’s canals and rivers. The result? At least 40 drownings in just a few days, many tied directly to the desperate search for cooling.
This follows the grim pattern of recent European summers, where heat-related deaths have repeatedly hit 50,000 to 68,000 in single seasons across the continent.
Climate advocate Bjorn Lomborg, Energy analyst Roger Pielke Jr. and others have highlighted studies which quantify the avoidable tragedy. Europe maintains the highest per-capita heat-death rate among wealthy regions despite fewer extremely hot days by latitude.
Air conditioning penetration sits at roughly 19% continent-wide — compared to 76% in North America and over 90% in the United States and Japan. If Europe simply matched U.S. levels of adoption, an estimated 26,000 heat deaths could be prevented in a hot summer like 2022. Near-universal coverage could save even more.
The mechanism is straightforward and well-documented: studies show air conditioning has driven roughly 75% reductions in heat-mortality risk where it is widely available. Most European heat deaths occur indoors among the elderly and those with chronic conditions, the very people who benefit most from mechanical cooling.
Yet policymakers in France, Spain, the UK, and elsewhere prioritize emissions targets over adaptation.
In Britain, the pattern is especially brutal. The Labour government, cleaving religiously to Climate Minister Ed Miliband’s net-zero obsessions, has authorized local authorities to rip air conditioning units from homes. Local councils enforce planning rules that favor “passive cooling” methods — mandating absurd alternatives like opening windows and hoping for the best – while cracking down on external units deemed unauthorized.
Critics, including former Conservative ministers, rightly note that Britain is being “kept in the dark ages” under a net-zero mindset that denies people “modern conveniences that are completely normal in other countries.”
France has long restricted air conditioning in public buildings, with rules limiting cooling to no lower than about 26°C (79°F) in many spaces since the mid-2000s as climate alarm activists have labeled AC an “environmental aberration.” The result is a shrugging acceptance that thousands will suffer or die so the continent can chase symbolic emissions cuts.
It all amounts a fealty to quasi-religious dogma dressed in bureaucratic clothing. Air conditioning is not some futuristic indulgence. It has been commercially available for over a century and transformed living standards wherever it spread.
The United States adopted it aggressively after World War II; heat-related mortality plummeted even as summers remained hot, which they tend to do. Europe, by contrast, clings to fears about energy demand and emissions while its grids struggle under intermittent renewables and self-imposed constraints.
Net-zero ideology demands reduced energy consumption as an end in itself. Air conditioning increases electricity use during peaks, so it must be discouraged or banned outright in the name of “degrowth” and climate virtue
Europe’s leaders are not protecting their citizens from the climate. They are protecting their ideology from inconvenient reality.
By systematically denying access to proven cooling technology, they are sentencing the vulnerable — especially the home-bound sick and elderly — to higher risk of death. It is a special form of madness: governments so terrified of a changing climate that they actively allow their people to die as a result of the weather.
In the United States, energy abundance and technological adoption remain the default. Citizens and visitors alike benefit from the simple recognition that human welfare comes first. Europe’s net-zero priesthood would do well to remember that no amount of canal swimming or passive-cooling lectures will bring back the lives lost to ideological rigidity.
Europe’s contrast with America could not be clearer. It is no wonder, then, that so many European soccer fans here for the World Cup have gushed in their social media posts about how cool it is in every Wal-Mart, Buc-ees and Texas barbecue joint they visit. God bless America.
David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
(DCNF)