Singapore Founding Father: Air Conditioning Was the Secret to Success (2015)

Posted4 months agoActive4 months ago

tosh

38 points

11 comments

vox.comSciencestory

calmmixed

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40/100

Air ConditioningClimate ChangeUrban Development

Key topics

Air Conditioning

Climate Change

Urban Development

The article discusses how air conditioning contributed to Singapore's success, and the discussion revolves around its implications for modern society, including its role in addressing climate change and its potential for centralized implementation.

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01Story posted
Sep 1, 2025 at 6:27 AM EDT
4 months ago
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Sep 2, 2025 at 8:20 AM EDT
4 months ago
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Discussion (11 comments)

Showing 11 comments

nis0s

4 months ago

2 replies

It’s a real concern in the context of changing climates

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014765132...

We need nuclear-powered energy and cooling tech everywhere.

anon191928

4 months ago

I support nuclear but no everywhere because not everywhere is safe or have people with knowledge to manage nuclear. I mean there are places with not strong energy infra. and security.

tim333

4 months ago

I would have thought aircon is a good match for solar power, with it mostly being used in sunny places?

Such systems are widely advertised on AliBaba for not much money eg. https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/24000btu-36000btu-Gre...

PicassoCTs

4 months ago

1 reply

I never understood though, why the air conditioning of Singapore is not centralized. One heat chimney

quickthrowman

4 months ago

1 reply

It looks like there’s a district cooling project in Singapore, unsure of the progress: https://www.spgroup.com.sg/sustainable-energy-solutions/dist...

It makes a lot of sense to do district cooling in Singapore, surprised it didn’t happen earlier but laying all those pipes in an existing city can be challenging. Both of the major cities in my metro area have district cooling and heating, and so does the local land grant university.

mensetmanusman

4 months ago

2 replies

More things can go wrong with condensation in one giant system than thousands of less complex systems?

Doxin

4 months ago

1 reply

I don't think that's true actually. Not only do you get fewer parts in total, you also very quickly get to a scale where tracking part wear in detail becomes sensible. Slightly bigger scale and you get essentially 24/7 engineering coverage.

Yes a failure will affect a larger group of people, but it's also much less likely to occur, and much more likely to be fixed quickly.

As a thought experiment imagine everyone running their own privately owned diesel generator. Would that be more reliable than what we have now?

mensetmanusman

4 months ago

I see where you are coming from, because it’s usually the case that centralizing has economies of scale. The surface area of moving cold air and the damage a missed cold spot causes from condensation or a too-cold spot causes an ice jam seems to be a big materials challenge.

Cities have centralized steam systems for nearly 100 years, so there are probably different sets of challenges with central AC or folks would have figured it out? It might be something along the lines of the heat exchange system would be ridiculously large?

PicassoCTs

4 months ago

My AC that is lower in the housing complex literally heats your AC that hire on the termite hill? Thats almost the definition of getting roasted..

egorfine

4 months ago

Germans will read that article and then double down on their disdain toward air conditioning.

(Yeah, I'm suffering it as well)

nocoiner

4 months ago

I live in the American sunbelt and my residential AC has basically been out the last week. I can easily see why this region was such a backwater until air conditioning became widespread.

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ID: 45091430Type: storyLast synced: 11/20/2025, 5:57:30 PM

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