Cooling will be the main contributor to the growing demand for electricity between now and 2050.
Rising temperatures, population growth, urbanization and development trends are causing an unprecedented surge in global cooling demand. Today, 1.2 billion people are at high risk of facing serious health, productivity, and nutritious issues because they lack adequate access to cooling (SEforALL, 2022). But the more we cool, the more we heat the planet. By combining energy efficiency improvements with the transition away from super-polluting refrigerants, the world could avoid cumulative greenhouse gas emissions of up to 210-460 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (GtCO2e) over the next four decades, roughly equal to 4-8 years of total annual emissions based on 2018 levels (IEA, 2020).
