Unnecessary air conditioning

[SunshineHello]

Why is it suddenly a ‘thing’ for anywhere with air con to chill indoors to about 12 degrees, as soon as it’s mildly warm outdoors?

Shop staff all with jumpers on while it’s 25 degrees outside. Office workers spending their summers shivering at their desks under a jet of ice cold air.

Why?

YANBU. I've noticed in the last year or two that even on the middle of a heat wave I need to remember to take a jacket or jumper with me when I go to the supermarket. Even then the aisles with open fridges are unpleasant and not conducive to browsing.

During the hot hot weather last week I had to put the little radiator under my desk on. It’s so cold with the air con. Especially if you’re dressed for the outside weather. I leave a long thick cardigan at work now.

I thought I'd hear some insane stuff on here - but a fan heater or a radiator in an airconditioned office?

I don't think they do that for the menz - I suspect it is to stop food going off.

How is that insane? If you’re cold and the office temperature is set too low for your comfort, would you just sit and freeze?

I get raynaulds and air conditioned offices make it difficult for me to use a keyboard. Thankfully I mostly work from home now do set my own temperature for my comfort not Brian in accounts.

I appreciate why people do this on an individual level - the office is freezing and they want to warm up because otherwise they are very uncomfortable. I hate being cold, I was always cold in our office and had to wear fingerless gloves and warm hoodies etc and colleague used to work with a hot water bottle on her knee. But it’s horrible for the environment to be using energy to heat up a space that’s being cooled artificially(and using more energy to cool the space down).

One of the best things about working from home is not being cold all the time.

The freezing temps in the likes of co op is new. It used to be that the freezer section was thr only cold section. Now I walk into the high street co-op or m and s and they are freezing in every aisle. M and s are the worst, their staff are in fleeces and gloves! It must be terrible for environment to have entire stores chilled to icy!

Oh please do tell where I look up such things?

A standard temperature for cooling would be around 23C and for heating around 19C with a band in the middle where neither heating nor cooling operate. In a fully air conditioned office there will be units in the ceiling that trim the local temperature to what is set on a central building management system (there may be a local temperature setpoint in the room for adjustment by the occupant but this is less common these days)
If there is a unit in the room that operates as heating/cooling, then it isn't a whole building system.

The whole system is run to be as energy efficient and cheap as possible, and the people paying the bills don't want to over-cool spaces as cooling energy is more expensive than heating energy.

Now shops, especially food shops, have zones which are kept cooler than normal areas, this is for the benefit of the food and the refrigerators/freezers.

If you notice it being cold when you walk into a shop, this isn't usually because they have the cooling on full blast, it's because of the difference in temperature between outside and inside - thermal shock. The temperature setpoint inside a shop is often set to be higher on a hot day to mitigate thermal shock and to save money on cooling.

Also, a cooling unit is designed to lower the temperature by a fixed maximum amount ( the cooling capacity) and so if it's say 28C outside, a unit with a cooling capability of 12C will get the temperature down to 23C no problem. If however it's 38C outside, you won't get it below 26C however hard you try (assuming there aren't any heat/cooling recovery units in play)

I design HVAC systems and am an energy consultant...

https://www.google.com/search?q=aircon+men+f+women&rlz=1C9BKJA_enAU811AU811&oq=aircon+men+f+women&aqs=chrome..69i57.4765j0j7&hl=en-GB&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#ip=1

There's a new law in Spain that public areas can cool to a minimum of 27 degrees and a maximum of 19 to save energy.

I think the research is in Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez. But I can’t find my copy right now to check.

Anyway, I agree that it’s usually set far too cold, (loving the term thermal shock, that’s exactly what I feel it is when I walk in) and I have to take a jumper with me for the air conditioned train, remove layers for the hot tube, and own a special office pashmina I keep at work for the freezing cold meeting rooms.

I've experienced the opposite of this! When the weather was in the upper 20s/low 30s last week,I went in several shops and coffee shops that I know have air con but it obviously wasn't on! I also went to the theatre to see a tribute band a couple of weeks ago,on what was one of the hottest days of the year (34 degrees) and was relieved to see that the theatre's website stated that it had air con. Unfortunately,it did not appear to be on and the whole experience was slightly marred by it being stiflingly hot.

@Fightyouforthatpie I didn't say it was for the menz, that was someone else. And the fridges are probably what stops the food going off rather than the air conditioning. They'd work more efficiently if they put doors on them too.

Stand-alone systems are more prone to tripping in hotter weather (overheating due to overload) & if nobody knows how to reset them they won't work.

Back in the 90s, it was always assumed that women complained more because they were wearing inadequate clothing (which could have been a factor, but not due to women not wearing the right clothes but due to office dress codes...) but it's good that more research is being done into this. The problem is that not enough women work as building managers (maintenance type people) so things are set up for the default man. I do my best in design & consulting but you need more women doing the work (and it's pretty well paid)

I’m female and 19c office air con is ideal for me, it also keeps most people away because they complain that my office is cold 😂

@megletthesecond My flat has been stifling for weeks. The weather has barely been out of the 20s. As opposed to one week of snow last December

Brits would rather die than put in air conditioning.

https://x.com/tomsdinner/status/1668840290239512576?s=20

To be honest I like it. We have a portable aircon unit (quite big) as we live in an apartment with a south facing 10ft window. All rooms are on the same south facing side, so even on a sunny day in winter it will heat the apartment up to about 25. In summer however, without it we face indoor temps of the high 30's even if it's only 25 outside. So there's nothing I love more than sitting shivering in front of the aircon for a bit 🤣

If you’re cold put a jumper on or another layer. Some of us are boiling or having a moment

I'm menopausal and hate how warm the office I work in gets. Women walking round in shift dresses with no sleeves or tights complaining they're cold... put some clothes on! I can't sit in my pants!

You'll understand when you hit menopause how awful it is to be hot all the time. I love AC!

Ditto, and I've had a/c at home (UK, Midlands) since 2013. 19C to 20C is my ideal room temperature and it doesn't break the bank, heating or cooling. In fact the heating costs way more than a/c does according to my energy usage charts.

I'm not, nor have I ever been, a man. But it's ME who needs everything cold and will even have it cold enough that I can put my comfy sweater on (don't do it often, environment and cost etc) and every man I can think of who I've known has been bloody precious and needed heating on in September.

I've seen that in a posh hotel in the US. Aircon at full blast and electric fireplace on to give the feeling of cosy. Talk about global warming.

I did ask if the aircon could be less cold and was told no everyone else was fine. My feet were freezing. Well I'll heat the area under my desk.

Oh God I'd love to work in an air-conditioned office, and travel on an air-conditioned train/bus/tube. Unfortunately, I don't so it's been too fucking hot everywhere for weeks now. Miserable. Bring on the cold weather (although I hate the ridiculous heating my trains have, because it gets so stuffy on a packed commuter train).

Not everyone thinks air-conditioning is freezing. Am jealous!