Air conditioning grows in Italy as global warming bakes Europe

I walked by the statue of Julius Caesar near the Roman Forum the other day. He was holding a bottle of Gatorade. It was empty.

Two priests in St. Peter’s Square were seen doing the backstroke in Bernini’s fountain.

A posse of stray cats left a Rome street and checked in at the Hyatt.

Me? I sit in my apartment and eat fruit.

Rome is burning again, folks. Fortunately, I have air conditioning. So does half of Italy. In recent years, AC has become more popular in Italy than pistachio gelato. 

Today 56 percent of Italian households have air conditioners. That’s double what it was in 2013 and amounts to one-third of all usage in the European Union. Appliance stores in Rome are selling out. Italian health officials are cautioning residents about overuse.

Air conditioning sales up

“Year by year we sell more and more,” said Valentina Morabito, an employee at Unieuro, one of Rome’s leading appliance chains. “I’ve worked here eight years and we started to sell more in these past two or three years because the weather changed.

“It’s warmer now.”

As she spoke Sunday, a whirl of electric fans and air conditioners made her showroom comfy and fresh. Outside, Rome baked in 95 degrees (35 celcius) and 47 percent humidity. Most of last week was in the high 90s with humidity jumping to 65 percent in the evening.

For years I’ve warned readers not to visit Rome in July. It’s too damn hot and crowded. It’s hotter now. 

During the recent World Cup, I cringed at Americans politicizing – of all things – air conditioning. They point to 90 percent of the U.S. has AC compared to 20 percent in Europe, proving once and for all, of course, that the United States has a superior civilization.

However, in Italy that’s changing. And it’s changing because of the global warming caused by the environmental protection policies the Republican Party has continually squashed. 

“A July like this we’ve never had,” said Francesco Giorgi, 69, who runs Elettrogianicolense, a small appliance store near my home. “This is the worst I’ve ever experienced in my life.”

Italians are buying ACs like they’re moving into Dante’s Inferno. Giorgi said his sales are 50 percent more than 10 years ago. Morabito said Unieuro’s sales are up 20-30 percent over last year. 

Unieuro had sold out of the little portable air conditioning unit, known as the penguino, as it resembles a little penguin. 

Fortunately, electricity prices in Italy have actually gone down since the 2022 energy crisis surge. Last July and August I paid only €73.74 for electricity which covers my AC.

Health concerns

Is global warming the only reason for the sales surge? No. For decades, Italians feared AC was a health hazard, like an evil demon hanging on your wall.

Giorgi admits, “The dust inside the AC you have to clean often because the AC is not good for the lungs.”

Added Morabito: “In Italy, you need, not every year but at least once every two or three years, to clean the air conditioner. Like the filters. Nobody does this. So the air that comes from the AC, maybe it’s dirty, dusty and it’s not good for our health.

“What can we do? Nothing. If it’s hot, you need AC to sleep. It’s impossible to stay outside. You stay inside your house.”

How hot is it?

You climate change deniers? You may want to skip these next few paragraphs if you haven’t hit the X on your screen already. 

Europe is warming twice the global average. It sits under a heat dome where high atmospheric pressure traps hot air and prevents cold air from coming in. The Mediterranean and Atlantic water temperatures have gone up 3 degrees Fahrenheit over the last 40 years as air temperatures reach dangerous levels. 

Europe has warmed by 0.9 degrees (0.5 celsius) every decade since the 1980s, meaning Europe’s average temperature has gone up 4 degrees Fahrenheit in 40 years. 

That is unprecedented in European annals.

The number of days labeled “strong heat stress” (feels at least 90 degrees or 32 celsius) did not rise until the 1990s. Since then, it has skyrocketed to 18 in 2022, 27 in 2023, 25 in 2024 and 26 in 2025.

The 1980s averaged 10.

Rivers are shrinking. Crops are failing. Soils are dying.

One reason Europe is getting the brunt of global warming’s force is Northern Europe is connected to the Arctic where temperatures have risen 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit in the last 50 years.  If you don’t believe it, check out the many viral online photos of a polar bear mother and her cub abandoned on a small breakaway iceberg.

Consequently, heat has become deadly. In 2024, when heat records were broken all over Europe and where Rome hit a record 109, 62,800 people in Europe died of heat-related causes. The World Health Organization said over the last 20 years, heat-related deaths in Europe are up 30 percent.

Home cooking in Rome

I have excellent AC units in my living room and bedroom but when the AC is off, my apartment sits at 90 degrees. On July 9, 2024, the day Rome hit 109, my living room unit didn’t work. Going from my cool – almost chilly – bedroom to my front door was like walking through a greenhouse for African violets.

This month I’ve seen few Rome restaurants with outdoor seating for lunch. When I see an entire bus full of people fanning themselves, I wait for another bus with AC. This heat has made people lazy. On Saturday afternoon, my gym had all of two other people.

I lived in Rome from 2001-03 without an air conditioner. I don’t remember wishing I had it.

“Maybe I’m getting older but even going out from this shop or in the evening it’s getting complicated,” Morabito said. “Like two days ago I went out with my friends. We were in Circo Massimo and it was evening. We stayed one hour to eat something then everybody said bye-bye.

“It’s too hot to stay outside.”

What Italy is doing

Europe is much more environmentally conscious than the U.S. Even Italy’s right-wing prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, believes in global warming. Consequently, Italy has been a bit overly cautious with its policies.

Giorgio Sesti, former president of the Italian Society of Internal Medicine, told Italians to use AC for cooling the bedroom but don’t let it hit your body. You could lose your voice or have joint problems.

I read we’re told to put our AC no more than 5 degrees Celsius below the temperature outside. 

Cazzata! (Bullshit!) Tell my dry cleaner that. 

If it’s 39 degrees (102 fahrenheit) outside, I put it at 34 (93F)? OK. I will – next time I decide to fry an egg on my desk. I set my AC at 23 (73F) and have it on only for four-five hours in the afternoon. 

In the meantime, Rome mayor Roberto Gualtieri is replacing some of the city’s widespread asphalt with green spaces and climate shelters for the public. They feature water, shade, seats and fans or AC.

In 2022 he began a depavimentazione, an initiative to depave non-porous concrete and asphalt. 

“We are the first city in Italy to present a real strategy to reduce the impact of heat,” Gualtieri said in The Local, Italy’s lone English-language news source. “We cannot remain idle in the face of threats that risk undermining essential infrastructure and urban livability and have the greatest impact on the most vulnerable.”

This won’t let up anytime soon. I’m facing another six weeks of this before Rome again becomes the city of our dreams and not a subject in Dante Alighieri’s Hell. 

I wonder where Caesar got that Gatorade.