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Will historians look back at the summer heatwave of 2006

Except for one. There is a piece of 20th-century technology—seldom discussed or even noticed because it is practically invisible when working as it should—which has played a role in shaping the modern world almost as big as the motor car or the aeroplane. Its contribution to carbon emissions and climate change has been just as disastrous, in its way, and is set to make an even bigger impact in the near future. Step forward, please, the

achines as a child, and eventually won a mechanical engineering scholarship to Cornell University. His first job on graduation was with the Buffalo Forge Company, a manufacturer of heaters and blowers, where he was quickly put in charge of an experimental department. In 1902, at the age of 25, he devised and installed the world’s first air-conditioner for the Sackett-Wilhelms Lithographing and Publishing Company in Brooklyn. The firm had been unable to print reliable colours because of the effec