This is a tricky question for those who are not related to #environment sector. Instead of answering directly I would derive the answer based on logical reasoning.

You must be thinking that

• Usage of AC doesn’t cause any smoke nor does it produce any garbage. Thus it is perfectly okay to overuse it without causing any environmental damage and/or Global warming. You should just be capable to pay the electricity bills.

• Plastics, on other hand, causes lots of problems for environment and thus it causes more #globalwarming.

But

You need to understand that everything which causes environmental damage doesn’t cause global warming. Global warming is actually a subset of environmental damage. Global warming is principally caused by six gases and out of which most prominent is carbon dioxide. Now you must be thinking how does AC produce carbon dioxide. Here is the explanation.

A typical home AC consumes 2kWh of electrical #energy in one hour. This power is drawn from National Grid. The grid draws energy from various sources like hydro, nuclear and thermal. Ideally if grid gets all power from hydro, nuclear and renewable sources, our AC won’t cause any global warming. Unfortunately, our grid (#India) draws 65% of Electricity from coal based power plants.

In simple words, every kWh of energy drawn from grid causes 0.9kg emission of carbon dioxide. This number is derived after computing all the sources of power production in our country i.e. India and may differ for other countries. As long as you are using 2kWh AC in any part of India, you are roughly causing

1.8 kg (0.9 x 2) of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission into the atmosphere. It will obviously not occur in your home but it doesn’t matter. As long as CO2 is emitted due to your activity, it will cause global warming.

In simple words the more electricity we consume, the more global warming we create. This fact can change only if all the electricity in our national grid is generated from renewable sources, which doesn’t look possible in next 2-3 decades. 2-3 decades is enough to cause irreparable damage to our planet.

What about plastics

Plastics are one of the most toxic material for environment. But if we talk specifically about global warming then plastics are ranked lower than life cycle of AC.