Well, logos, I'll trade you your 17C temps with my 39C-40C temperature here in Midtown Manhattan.

It's a lot colder right now :-( 11pm

When we were in Germany the last couple weeks, during the heat wave, there were a couple days when I would have liked to have AC. Mostly I just wished that ceiling fans were a known entity in that part of the world. I am not generally an AC person though - we don't have it at home and I generally only wish for it when the temperature gets close to 100F. Otherwise a cool drink and some shade are plenty to keep me comfortable. For people who are used to AC, I can see how that could have been a problem. I did develop a nice taste for sparkling mineral water in cafes - very cool and refreshing :)

With all the really hot weather we've had here in Southern California, A/C has been a must. It was 110 and over last week. But all that A/C comes at a cost. My boss commented today that her electric bill came today. The cost to cool her 2000 sq foot home to 79 degrees for the month of July was a whopping $842.00!

The problem with the U.K. is that you never know what the weather is going to do ahead of time. I did a house exchange in the summer of 2000 and we had to use the heating in August. When I lived there as a student several decades ago, we had a snow fall in June. I would guess that having two hot summers in a row is unlikely. You could go to a bookies and find what the odds are.

i had a meeting with a team during the heatwave here in the UK a couple of weeks ago. everyone (five people) in the meeting was talking about how they were getting quotes to install aircon in their houses and exchanging ideas. now that the heatwave is over, they are still talking about installing aircon. they cited the perception that it's getting warmer each summer.

it may indeed be getting warmer each year but britons are also getting more prosperous, increasingly working in airconditioned offices and driving airconditioned cars. only a matter of time before airconditioning in houses becomes popular.

First time we went to London we all packed shorts and tshirts. It was early June, but heck, we're from Arizona. May, June, July, August and September are hot... and usually most of October. Well, we nearly froze our behinds off. Every one of us bought sweatshirts and wore them most days. Also went to London in 2004. It wasn't cold, but was fine without A/C in the hotel. But you never know.

Europe gets hotter each summer, and even the temperatures from a few years ago are no longer reliable predictors of the weather today.

Well - I've been taking in the reports of the hot weather in SE England. Not "normal" at all. Look - most times you are lucky if London reaches 25C in the summer and then it's a lovely day and everybody is happy.

The problem is not the lack or otherwise of a/c - the problem is rooms in hotels with hermetically sealed windows.

Honest - I've lived in London off and on for the last 20 years and have NEVER felt the need for a/c. On those very VERY VERY rare days when the temps soar just grin and bear it. I agree it's a different matter in the tube!!

And just think - all those sealed rooms with a/c are eating up energy, and pumping out more carbon dioxide - which is making the planet hotter - which is adding to the perceived need for artifical cooling.

And whoever it was that said that you need a/c anywhere in Europe except Scandinavia is mad.

My recommendation - ask the hotel if they have windows that open; open them, and you'll be fine - and you'll be doing the planet a favour too.

Those "very, very rare" days are not rare anymore. Eventually London will have to be air-conditioned, like most hot climates. The same will be true for many other European cities where A/C is now still the exception to the rule.

Air-conditioning units do not "pump out carbon dioxide." If you want to help stop global warming, stop using motor vehicles and become a vegetarian. A/C is just a tiny drop in a big bucket, and in hot weather, it's essential.

Anthony - do you live in Europe? I assume you do seeing as you speak as an expert. If so, please advise where - if not, please advise how many days you have spent there in the last 10 years. I think we should be told.

MS. HW,
Where are you going in the UK next summer?
Scotland and Northern Wales will offer cooler temperatures than London. Highlands and beach areas can also offer comfortable temperatures. Find out what the 'locals' do to survive.

I switched the heating on today, 14C, dark clouds, warning of rainfalls over 100 liters/square meter in southern Bavaria. Where's summer?

Why is it okay to switch the heating on at 14° C, but decadent and wasteful and destructive to the environment to turn on the A/C at 26° C, or even 36° C?

I live in Paris, BTW.

Antony, if you want to switch your airco on, please do so. It's a free world. I feel comfortable with 30°c, so I don't want it. Get a life.

I've never told anyone not to use cooling or heating. Do what you want.

We all know or at least we all should know that a lot of it is simply what we have allowed our bodies to get used to and is a product of a lot of economic and social issues too (not being said in a perjorative manner)...

I get used to AC in the summer because of where I live (NYC area) and not only do temperatures soar a good deal during the summer but it's quite humid...also I have learned to feel the difference as just about 100% of the public buses and subway cars are air conditoned and the air conditioning works very well (score one for the much maligned NYC public transportation over say London)...

I go to London and while it may not always be that hot (25 degrees say) the humidity makes me feel terribly uncomfortable probably much more so than an average Londoner (such as my friends)...I feel very uncomfortable trying to sleep in their flats when I visit and I get laughed at in a friendly sort of ways...I sometimes find the buses a little uncomfortable and certainly the tube is downright uncomfortable and I start sweating almost as soon as I get down there...tfl claims it is impossible to air condition some of the tube trains because of very very tight clearance in some of the deep tunnels (personally I think where there is a will there is a way, they managed to do that in NY on what used to be called the IRT when for years the MTA said the cars were too narrow)...but whether it is worth it or not given the number of days of true heat down there is a question only those paying the freight have to answer.

However, let me say that I am not a scientist but I remember something being tossed down my head in science class called the conservation of energy law....with all the AC's on just about every car sold in the USA, with air conditioning on the buses and trains and whatever, the heat has to go somewhere, right? And I suppose this has to be adding to the outside heat in those places (almost all of the USA?) where using a/c is very prevelent unless the temperature goes under 20 degrees C.

The heat has to go somewhere for both heating and cooling. There's nothing particularly evil about cooling. It all contributes to the heat death of the universe.

Human physiology is quite fixed, and core temperatures must be held to fairly absolute values with very little margin. With a given heat index, the same number of people will die of heatstroke no matter what the society in which the heat index is found.

Of all weather phenomena, heat is the deadliest.