US risk of 'heat disasters' intensifies

By Kate Ravilious

When it comes to weather disasters, the biggest killers in the US are extreme heat and cold. Many people rely on air-conditioning to keep them cool but this dependency could be dangerous if a power cut coincides with hot weather. Residential buildings in many US cities are highly vulnerable to such heat disasters, according to a new study, and that danger will become greater as climate changes.

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Nine major US cities – Miami, Houston, Tampa, St Louis, Dallas, Chicago, Phoenix, Philadelphia and Atlanta – with a combined population of 52 million people had buildings that could overheat in less than seven hours and remain overheated for at least 40% of a three-day-long hot period. Many of these cities are also humid.

“People in these cities rely on air-conditioning, and a major power outage could have devastating consequences,” says Sailor.

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The risk of heat disasters will increase as climate changes and in urban areas will be amplified by the urban heat island effect. Sailor and colleagues say that designers should be encouraged or required to investigate how their buildings will respond to air-conditioning failure during a heatwave, and to meet a maximum allowable rate of indoor warming. And the researchers suggest that better guidelines are needed for climate-sensitive design in general.