China's cool reply to heated air-con debate

Hot political issue

Hours after finally bringing the unit home, Yurchak reflected on the contrast in approaches to air-conditioning that many Europeans have increasingly begun discussing.

"Before moving to Europe, I lived in Russia, and it was completely normal for people to have ACs there," he said.

"Even though Russia is much poorer than the EU by every metric, and I dare say much colder, people install ACs to live through the two or three weeks of 30 C heat in summer comfortably.

"I never regretted moving to the EU — I like living here and contributing with my tax. But the EU AC madness makes me wanna just wake up in my air-conditioned apartment in Moscow and forget all these damn mobile AC units that barely cool the room."

Across Europe, particularly in France, complaints about the difficulty of buying and installing air conditioners have spread rapidly across social media this summer, and what was once largely a consumer issue has increasingly become a political one.

For years, many environmental advocates argued that wider adoption would increase electricity demand, raise carbon emissions and ultimately worsen climate change.

Yet, with the record heat of 2026, voices in favor of wider air-conditioning access have risen. Among the loudest has been French far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who has proposed what she describes as her "grand air-conditioning plan" as part of her campaign ahead of France's next presidential election.

Her proposal has drawn criticism from across the political spectrum, but relatively few opponents argue against air-conditioning itself.

Among the most outspoken is French left-wing leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, who argues that installing air conditioning everywhere "would only make things worse", saying it would ultimately increase the damage caused by climate change.

Many others who once firmly opposed wider air-conditioning now argue that it should not be installed everywhere or relied upon as the only solution. The tone of the debate has shifted from whether Europe should use air conditioning to where and how it should be used.

"We are looking at all the social media posts and it feels that we can have a real positive impact on people's lives and many people call PortaSplit a 'lifesaver' and tell about their great experience online," said Manuel Seethaler, head of residential air-conditioning public relations and strategy at Midea Europe GmbH.

"We are always improving the current version either via software upgrades or introducing new window brackets, to allow more applications. For example, PortaSplit started sales in the United Kingdom this year, and of course it was sold out in a short time," he said.

Xiong, from the Midea Group, said the company has sold over 200,000 units in Europe this year. The top three sales countries are Germany, France and the UK.

"We have many containers at the seaports or that are about to arrive at the ports, which will be cleared through customs soon and delivered to the sales channels, so customers can receive the products shortly," said Xiong.

"Meanwhile, the factories are producing them as quickly as possible. We are also shipping some containers via China-Europe Railway Express, which can reach end-users more quickly compared with sea freight."

Asked whether she lived in an air-conditioned home, Sasha, a young woman in Brussels, smiled and said she had suffered through several summers without one.

Her classmate Karli said her family had bought an electric fan much earlier this year because experience had taught them, "Every year, if there is a heat wave, fans sell out."

Zheng Wanyin contributed to this story.

Contact the writers at zhangzhouxiang@chinadaily.com.cn