True, there’s a lot of heating necessary to make life comfortable in Europe (but also in USA btw. probably even more, because I’d say the standards for insulation are better in Europe, and temperatures are more extreme more in the center of the continent).
But it’s absolutely possible to live without (most of) the heating, by:
Using passive solar energy (even in the winter) + good insulation
Clothing! There are ways to help with heat too via evaporation chill though (I’m just sitting here with a cooling west, because I easily overheat, and that makes my life quite bit more comfortable in summer without AC, even or especially outside)
Though as you correctly notice, the combination of high temperature and humidity is what potentially creates a dangerous climate for life, even with things such as cooling wests in “low” high temperatures (within 30-40C), because evaporation chill stops working, so there are times and places, and these times and places will get more frequent where humans can’t survive outside (without some serious technological counter-measures) while with cold temperatures you can always wear (somewhat specialized) clothing.
Evaporation chill does work even with quite high temperatures, but at some point (and I do think there are places that reach that point), the quite effective human cooling system is not able to catch up anymore (I think somewhere around 50+C IIRC).
I would still insist that heating is the only way to make much of Europe permanently inhabitable. Yes, houses get more efficient and the energy necessary gets less (same is true for cooling a house though). Still, we had a week of permanent -10°C 1,5a ago. Without heating we’d probably have to count the deaths in the millions for that week alone.
Yeah, certainly it would increase the risk of deaths, humans aren’t made for these extremes. (Btw. I think you mean “habitable” instead of “inhabitable”).
But getting above some temperatures on average really makes these places deadly. Interesting article dealing with this topic, and more approachable article (which is based on that study)
True, there’s a lot of heating necessary to make life comfortable in Europe (but also in USA btw. probably even more, because I’d say the standards for insulation are better in Europe, and temperatures are more extreme more in the center of the continent).
But it’s absolutely possible to live without (most of) the heating, by:
Though as you correctly notice, the combination of high temperature and humidity is what potentially creates a dangerous climate for life, even with things such as cooling wests in “low” high temperatures (within 30-40C), because evaporation chill stops working, so there are times and places, and these times and places will get more frequent where humans can’t survive outside (without some serious technological counter-measures) while with cold temperatures you can always wear (somewhat specialized) clothing.
Evaporation chill does work even with quite high temperatures, but at some point (and I do think there are places that reach that point), the quite effective human cooling system is not able to catch up anymore (I think somewhere around 50+C IIRC).
I would still insist that heating is the only way to make much of Europe permanently inhabitable. Yes, houses get more efficient and the energy necessary gets less (same is true for cooling a house though). Still, we had a week of permanent -10°C 1,5a ago. Without heating we’d probably have to count the deaths in the millions for that week alone.
Yeah, certainly it would increase the risk of deaths, humans aren’t made for these extremes. (Btw. I think you mean “habitable” instead of “inhabitable”).
But getting above some temperatures on average really makes these places deadly. Interesting article dealing with this topic, and more approachable article (which is based on that study)