Govt recommends 24°C as default settings for Air Conditioners
Union Power Minister of State RK Singh on Friday held a meeting with major air-conditioner manufacturers in New Delhi, and recommended them to maintain the default temperature setting in the appliance at 24° Celsius to promote energy efficiency. The Power Ministry may soon make its recommendation mandatory. Here's more.
Ministry also asked manufacturers to put optimum-temperature label on ACs
Further, in order to improve consumer awareness on energy efficiency, Singh also asked manufacturers to put labels indicating optimum temperature on the AC. The government plans to send an advisory to all air-conditioned establishments and AC manufacturers about the same.
1° temperature increase could save 20bn units of electricity: Singh
"Every 1° increase in the air-conditioner temperature setting results in saving of 6% of electricity consumed. If all the consumers adopt, this will result in savings of 20 billion units of electricity in one year alone," Union Power Minister of State RK Singh said.
India's energy consumption for cooling increased by 15x since 1990
India has witnessed a 15-fold increase in its energy consumption for cooling since 1990, according to a recent report by the International Energy Agency (IEA). Also, if we go by the current market trends, the total connected load in India due to air conditioning is expected to reach 200 GW by 2030, as per Bureau of Energy Efficiency's findings.
Power Ministry may make its suggestions mandatory after 4-6 months
After running an awareness campaign for four to six months and collecting public feedback, the Power Ministry will consider making both of its suggestions- 24°C as default settings of ACs and presence of optimum temperature labels on ACs- mandatory. The government could make its suggestions compulsory for establishments including airports, hotels, offices, shopping malls and government buildings.
