>According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 87 percent of American households are equipped with air-conditioning, and the United States expends about 185 billion kilowatt hours of energy annually on residential cooling.  […]

Rapid increases in the ownership of air conditioners are already occurring in many developing countries. According to research by McNeil and Letschert, the percentage of urban Chinese households with an air conditioner jumped from less than 1 percent in 1990 to 62 percent in 2003. In 2010 alone, 50 million air-conditioning units were sold in China.  […]

[…] eight countries have the potential to exceed the United States’ yardstick of high air-conditioning usage, because of their warm climates and significant populations. Furthermore, the top three could surpass the United States by substantial amounts: India, China, and Indonesia by factors of 14, 5.2, and 3.1, respectively, if they adopt American standards of cooling.

[…] Several institutions have recently made major technical advances in the design of more energy-efficient air conditioners. For example, developments at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory suggest that efficiency improvements of 20 to 70 percent are possible compared to current models of air conditioners. Changes in housing design and urban planning are also needed […]<