Skip to Content

Who Needs AC in the US

View Live Map

Why we love it


Intuitive colours in this map hint at the amount of cooling you would want in your home over the course of a year based on where you live. We love that you can click on any location to learn more about that area—an effect that pulls us into the map. This map is embedded in a rich thematic atlas about energy use and consumption that ties together heating and cooling needs with the sources and costs of energy.

Why it works


This map introduces us to “cooling degree days,” a way to determine how much you would need to cool your home in a typical year based on where you live. Smooth contours of the data show that cooling patterns are not related to more familiar political boundaries, such as state borders, but vary according to elevation, latitude, amount of sunshine and other climate factors.

Important steps

Previous
Next

Requirements

Previous
Next

Tips and tricks

Previous
Next
Headshot of Jim Herries, geographer and map curator

Start making maps with a free trial of ArcGIS

Try ArcGIS