Comfort colonialism, state and regulatory capture and capitalism preventing decarbonisation in the built environment

In the face of accelerating global heating, buildings are cited as being responsible for over 21% of all greenhouse gas GHG emissions. Despite investments in promoting energy efficiency, globally emissions are rising annually. Rising temperatures are driving the escalating use of air-conditioning, particularly in already warm climates. Current international thermal comfort standards used by the air-conditioning industry are statistically geared to drive overheating in winter and over-cooling in summer. They also promote an artificially narrow band of comfort temperatures embedded in national and international comfort standards and codes that require air-conditioning to achieve and do not reflect far wider range of comfort temperatures reported as comfortable in surveys by people in the buildings they live and work in. The flaws in regulations result in vast wastage of money and energy and consequent emissions of GHGs that increase with the size and height of buildings. Most of the growth in air-conditioning emissions is generated by large glass buildings that are proliferating in cities around the world, some now appear to being planned, constructed and operated beyond the control of government regulations. This paper relates the history of the air-conditioning industry and standards to the growth in GHG emissions and impacts on the health, safety, well-being and resilience of occupants to the history of buildings from the Colonial era, through Techno-Colonialism, State and Regulatory Capture of standards and Turbo-Capitalism. A note on the importance of Comfort Justice in weighing up options for future climate adaptation and mitigation actions concludes the paper.