Speaker 1: It's the big take from Bloomberg News and I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I'm West Cosova today. Extreme heat around the world and
Speaker 1: why it's not just another hot day. We're talking about
Speaker 1: heat today, and that might strike you as a bid
Speaker 1: odd especially if you live in the northern Hemisphere. Summer
Speaker 1: is a fading memory and winner it's coming on a
Speaker 1: little too fast. But that's kind of the point, because
Speaker 1: when it's not warm outside, it's easy to put out
Speaker 1: of your mind that the Earth is getting hotter in
Speaker 1: the winter too. And even when it is really hot outside,
Speaker 1: like when temperature spiked in many parts of the world
Speaker 1: this summer, we often just chalk it up to the weather.
Speaker 1: Degrees and din Heathrow Airport recorded a record eighty nine
Speaker 1: degrees on Sunday. Okay, I'll grant it. That's pretty hot.
Speaker 1: Guy Johnson's probably very miserable, and that's your first word news.
Speaker 1: That attitude is a big problem, especially in cities. Extreme
Speaker 1: heat is now a major health threat that is sickening
Speaker 1: and killing more and more people. This has led some
Speaker 1: cities to do something pretty interesting. The heat's not going away,
Speaker 1: so they've created a new job to learn how to
Speaker 1: live with it. They're called heat officers. This was a
Speaker 1: new one for me, so I asked the heat officers
Speaker 1: from two US cities to come on the show and
Speaker 1: tell us what it means to make a living battling heat.
Speaker 1: But first I check in with my colleague Linda Poon
Speaker 1: with Bloomberg City Lab. She covers why heat has become
Speaker 1: top of mind in cities. So, you know, when we
Speaker 1: think about climate change, we're bombarded with a lot of
Speaker 1: stories about floods and hurricanes and wildfires. But one of
Speaker 1: the things that weirdly gets overlooked on a lot of
Speaker 1: the time is global warring means like things are actually
Speaker 1: getting warmer, right, So extreme heat in particular is often
Speaker 1: called the invisible killer because in the US it is
Speaker 1: the largest killer of extreme weather. So extreme heat we
Speaker 1: don't see it, We don't see the devastation as prominently
Speaker 1: as hurricanes and stuff. So actually didn't know that. So
Speaker 1: more people in the US are killed by heat by
Speaker 1: extreme heat than by like hurricanes, wildfires and all the
Speaker 1: other things that we associate with climate change. Yep. Extreme
Speaker 1: heat is the deadliest form of extreme weather in the
Speaker 1: United States, causing more deaths on average than hurricanes and floods.
Speaker 1: Combined over the past thirty years. Just to give you
Speaker 1: some perspective, it doesn't take very much to reach the
Speaker 1: threshold of extreme heat depending on where you are. UM.
Speaker 1: And if you sort of combine that with you know,
Speaker 1: the social vulnerability of certain communities, UM, it's really easy
Speaker 1: to have adverse health effects from heat. Not all cities
Speaker 1: are quite prepared to adapt to it. It is this
Speaker 1: killer that far exceeds you know, big extreme weather events
Speaker 1: like hurricanes and floods. Cities can do something about it.
Speaker 1: You raised it. It's the next question, what are cities
Speaker 1: doing about this now? Because there seems to be a
Speaker 1: whole new trend now where world leaders are trying to
Speaker 1: do this at a very high level, but that cities
Speaker 1: really have become the forefront of new policies, uh, to
Speaker 1: try and figure out I guess more than just awareness,
Speaker 1: but actually trying to mitigate heat problems. So, yeah, if
Speaker 1: you think about where extreme heat is most dangerous, it's
Speaker 1: gonna be cities. Right. There's just phenomenon called the urban
Speaker 1: heat island effect where cities are you know, a certain
Speaker 1: degree higher than places in the countryside or even in
Speaker 1: the suburbs. So cities are really at the forefront of heat.
Speaker 1: They're most at risk, and they also are the ones
Speaker 1: to come up with some of the most creative solutions.
Speaker 1: Right now, they're implementing heat strategies into their climate adaptation plans.
Speaker 1: One of the things that you write about is how
Speaker 1: cities are trying to raise awareness by changing the way
Speaker 1: they talk about heat so that people realize, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: this isn't just a hot day, this is a problem. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So there's a lot of call to name heat because,
Speaker 1: like I said, he is invisible. So if we don't
Speaker 1: name it, we don't necessarily recognize it as you know,
Speaker 1: an extreme weather event. So on the one hand, there
Speaker 1: is this initiative to at least to even name the heat.
Speaker 1: But then uh, cities like aspen Um and Civil Spain,
Speaker 1: they're piloting this idea where you like you said, you
Speaker 1: categorize heat um category one, two three, and it's sort
Speaker 1: of being piloted by the Atlantic castles um are Rock
Speaker 1: Rockefeller Foundation so quick Aside Year. The Arst Rockefeller Foundation
Speaker 1: Resilience Center is a climate nonprofit that's named after its
Speaker 1: founding donors, philanthropists Adrian Art and the Rockefeller Foundation. The
Speaker 1: center held a press conference to discuss this new initiative
Speaker 1: back in July, and we have a clip here of
Speaker 1: Dr Larry Kulkstein, the guy leading the team behind this
Speaker 1: ranking system. They are less meteorologically oriented and more oriented
Speaker 1: towards the impacts of the heat. Even a category one
Speaker 1: is dangerous in many cities. Category ones kill a number
Speaker 1: of people, they just don't kill as many as category three.
Speaker 1: So it is important to know that a level one
Speaker 1: you do certain things, the level two you do those
Speaker 1: things and more. At a level three you do the
Speaker 1: maximum number of interventions or activities to make sure that
Speaker 1: people are safe, that the information is conveyed to the population,
Speaker 1: and that the urban area has designed a system to
Speaker 1: account for the fact that people are going to get
Speaker 1: ill and die in any of the three categories. So
Speaker 1: they are experimenting, they're working with city officials to really
Speaker 1: find the right categorization. It's not one size fits all
Speaker 1: sort of categorization, right. It depends on the city itself,
Speaker 1: same rules, but different system for every city because each
Speaker 1: city has different weather, has different demographics, has a different
Speaker 1: urban structure, so the response to heat is different in
Speaker 1: every city. UM So it stands to be seen if
Speaker 1: this will catch onto other cities. One thing that I
Speaker 1: found really interesting was UM if we think about in
Speaker 1: the US, a lot of delivery workers work in the
Speaker 1: sweltering heat, and there's this huge call for UPS drivers,
Speaker 1: USPS drivers, Amazon drivers UM for them to be protected
Speaker 1: because the best initiatives of these companies have come up
Speaker 1: with is to tell the drivers to stay hydrated. Problem solved, right,
Speaker 1: So it's a matter of maybe changing up the trucks
Speaker 1: that they drive so that it can provide better air
Speaker 1: conditioning but also not be a detriment to the earth.
Speaker 1: So it's thinking about the transportation vehicle and you know
Speaker 1: what policies UM can be set so that workers aren't
Speaker 1: outside and like the holliest time during the day. You're
Speaker 1: describing what cities are doing now to try to in
Speaker 1: some way get this under control or at least minimize
Speaker 1: the effect. How is it different the way cities look
Speaker 1: at heat now build policies around heat now versus the
Speaker 1: way they did, say just ten years ago. It's a
Speaker 1: lot about thinking about heat not as an afterthought, but
Speaker 1: thinking about how different policies would increase or decrease sort
Speaker 1: of the heat exposure of people. If we think about
Speaker 1: where to put buildings. He has to be the forefront
Speaker 1: everything about you know, lot of cities nowadays are looking
Speaker 1: at you know, if putting up a new building destroys trees,
Speaker 1: what needs to be done so that development does not
Speaker 1: um make things worse? Yes, right, So they're trying to
Speaker 1: be more forward thinking. Um So a lot of this
Speaker 1: is about just coordinating. At least in the US, a
Speaker 1: lot of the departments are siloed, so it's about bringing
Speaker 1: all them together to the table and thinking, hey, if
Speaker 1: you do this will increasing impact of heat. How can
Speaker 1: we change it so that we're thinking about heat as
Speaker 1: the main consequence of whatever policy you implement. So thanks
Speaker 1: to Linda, we've now heard about some of the problems
Speaker 1: extreme heat causes. When we come back, I talked to
Speaker 1: two people whose job it is to fix it. This
Speaker 1: year's You and Climate Change conferences happening. While global leaders
Speaker 1: argue what or how to slow the warming of the planet,
Speaker 1: communities are left to deal with a failure to make
Speaker 1: that happen. There's nothing a city can do to lower
Speaker 1: the Earth's thermostat, so instead, a small but growing number
Speaker 1: of local officials are searching for ways to make living
Speaker 1: with the reality of extreme heat more bearable and less deadly.
Speaker 1: I am really pleased today to have the chief east
Speaker 1: officers for two major American cities here with us. We
Speaker 1: have Jane Gilbert, the Chief Heat Officer for Miami Dade County,
Speaker 1: and Marches Sura, the Chief Heat Officer and Climate Emergency
Speaker 1: Mobilization Director for the City of Los Angeles. I gotta say, Martha,
Speaker 1: you have really got Jane beat on the title department.
Speaker 1: She can have my title any day. I agree. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for being here. Let me just
Speaker 1: ask the question. It is a chief Heat officer. So
Speaker 1: I was the first, and it was only a little
Speaker 1: over a year ago, right, and and I think there's
Speaker 1: going to be another one announced this month. So um, Really,
Speaker 1: we're looking at how is heat impacting people in their homes,
Speaker 1: at their workplaces, as they're going to and from work,
Speaker 1: as they're playing and recreating outside, and what can we
Speaker 1: do to both mitigate urban heat islands and help people
Speaker 1: to manage the inevitable extreme heat. Let me just talk
Speaker 1: you just right there. That's really good explanation. But tell
Speaker 1: me what an urban heat island is. Basically, an urban
Speaker 1: heat island is found in inner cities where there's a
Speaker 1: lot of concrete, where there's a lot of buildings, there's
Speaker 1: a lack of trees and shade. And then what it
Speaker 1: does is the heat exacerbates the pollution in the area.
Speaker 1: So instead of just having your everyday pollution, this air
Speaker 1: pollution stagnates, and the stagnation of that pollution causes more
Speaker 1: public health impacts, increases people's utility bills, increases company's utility
Speaker 1: bills because these buildings are hotter as a result of
Speaker 1: the urban heat island. The long term effect with extended
Speaker 1: heat waves is that people's bodies don't recover as quickly
Speaker 1: over a period of three days. You know, if you
Speaker 1: don't have the chance to cool down, that's when heat
Speaker 1: related deaths really go up. You describe the problem, but
Speaker 1: what is it that you usually do. You are sort
Speaker 1: of tasked with just making sure it doesn't get worse.
Speaker 1: I think the first thing is to understand who's most
Speaker 1: at risk. We're all at risk to extreme heat, but
Speaker 1: there's some of us that are more exposed and more
Speaker 1: sensitive to extreme heat. We looked at where the highest
Speaker 1: number of emergency room visits and hospitalizations related to extreme
Speaker 1: heat are and looked at the geographic and demographic characteristics
Speaker 1: of those zip codes and and now understand not surprisingly
Speaker 1: that people, very low income people, outdoor workers, and areas
Speaker 1: with very high land surface temperatures are where we see
Speaker 1: the most severe heat related illnesses. It's important to understand
Speaker 1: really what's the full scope of the problem and under
Speaker 1: what conditions are people dying. And what we learned is
Speaker 1: is that the majority of heat related deaths is actually
Speaker 1: under our current emergency advisory threshold for extreme heat here
Speaker 1: in Miami dates, so that needs to be shifted, and
Speaker 1: we're working with the National Weather Service. We need to
Speaker 1: focus our tree planting in those areas with the lowest
Speaker 1: tree canopy and the highest poverty rates. So you said
Speaker 1: a lot about how so much of this disproportionately affects
Speaker 1: lower income is and is really kind of part of
Speaker 1: a lot of historical neglect. If you live in an
Speaker 1: air conditioned home and can afford your utility costs and
Speaker 1: drive in an air conditioned car and work in an
Speaker 1: air conditioned environment, it's fine. But there are people who
Speaker 1: are unhoused. There are people who can't afford their air
Speaker 1: conditioning or their window unit breaks out, and they can't
Speaker 1: afford to replace it. I spoke to a woman last
Speaker 1: weekend who had that, and for three months this summer
Speaker 1: she was without a c that's life or death situation.
Speaker 1: We have three hundred thousand people who work outside every day.
Speaker 1: They're exposed to this day in and day out. So
Speaker 1: it takes sometimes for people to be made aware that
Speaker 1: while they may not be feeling the heat, so to speak,
Speaker 1: their neighbors and essential workers are I completely agree with
Speaker 1: what Change said, and I'll only add that where you
Speaker 1: have the greatest pollution burden, particularly in Los Angeles, you
Speaker 1: have the greatest number of pre existing health conditions like asthma, COPD,
Speaker 1: kidney disease, heart disease, diabetes. So when you take their
Speaker 1: health into consideration, and the pollution burden consideration, and the
Speaker 1: lack of infrastructure because of historical disinvestments, you realize that
Speaker 1: we really need to overhaul how we look at that
Speaker 1: built environment from a system's perspective. We want to make
Speaker 1: sure that we use no less than forty of those
Speaker 1: infrastructure investments and climate investments in these communities that have
Speaker 1: born the burden, and in l A we call them
Speaker 1: sacrifice zones and frontline communities, and they have been living
Speaker 1: a climate emergency much longer than the rest of us.
Speaker 1: We're actually taking information and advice and wisdom from communities,
Speaker 1: and we just delivered a report to the Climate Emergency
Speaker 1: Mobilization Mission on how the residents want to decarbonize Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: and that's going to advise the Council on our decarbonization
Speaker 1: policy about how we will reduce our greenhouse gas emissions
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles by reducing the emissions from buildings. But
Speaker 1: we have to make sure it's equitable, that it's safe,
Speaker 1: that tenants aren't being displaced, and that the rent for
Speaker 1: tenants isn't increasing as a result of our intent to
Speaker 1: make them healthier communities. So it sounds like in ordered
Speaker 1: for any of this to work, you're going to get
Speaker 1: to have a lot of buy in from not just
Speaker 1: politicians and business leaders, but from the communities themselves. Who
Speaker 1: are the stakeholders, who are the people you're trying to
Speaker 1: persuade in to bring along. Yeah, we can't do this alone.
Speaker 1: Even I'm working across county departments, but I have thirty
Speaker 1: four municipalities within Miami Dade County. We have a state
Speaker 1: Department of Health, we have a National Weather Service, all
Speaker 1: of them need to be activated towards addressing this problem.
Speaker 1: I guess want the challenges you may phase, especially in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles and Miami, is you know, like you said,
Speaker 1: it's hot there, and so people are like, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: a little hotter today, must be a heat wave, and
Speaker 1: they don't necessarily associate that with climate. Are you having
Speaker 1: a hard time getting people to understand the difference between
Speaker 1: those two I think the critical thing is to use data. Right,
Speaker 1: We've had over seventy more days on average with a
Speaker 1: heat index over ninety than we did in the nineteen sixties,
Speaker 1: and we're expected to have traumatic increases in even more
Speaker 1: dangerously high heat days heat and exist of a hundred
Speaker 1: and a hundred and five. So we're supposed to have
Speaker 1: fifty more days a year with a heat index over
Speaker 1: a hundred by mid century. That's well over a month
Speaker 1: and a half more days with that excessive high heat.
Speaker 1: It's that kind of data that helps people understand the difference.
Speaker 1: I agree we need to though simplify that. Basically, we
Speaker 1: have six times the number of heat waves, six times
Speaker 1: from from wind. That's that's from the early two thousand's
Speaker 1: six times greater number of heat waves greater number of
Speaker 1: heat waves in Los Angeles, and they're longer. They're not
Speaker 1: one day, they're not two days. Last time it was
Speaker 1: almost two weeks. Are heat wave lasted for two weeks.
Speaker 1: So when you make people understand or help people understand
Speaker 1: that their bodies can't recover because it's an extended heat
Speaker 1: wave if they leave live in these urban heat islands,
Speaker 1: and that's what's causing these exacerbated deaths and hospitalizations. When
Speaker 1: you connect it to their health and to their livelihood
Speaker 1: and their well being, I think that really helps us
Speaker 1: convey the message. Right, So Los Angeles is trying to
Speaker 1: use that as a way by which we talk to
Speaker 1: people through our heat Really for Los Angeles campaign, we
Speaker 1: absolutely need to make sure people really understand the risks
Speaker 1: associated with extreme heat and how they can better manage.
Speaker 1: So we you know, in Miami, we don't have extreme
Speaker 1: heat waves like you might have more on the West Coast.
Speaker 1: We have chronic high heat. We have five months with
Speaker 1: just about every day with the heat index over ninety degrees.
Speaker 1: So we declare May one through October thirty one a
Speaker 1: heat season, and the mayor charged me with raising public
Speaker 1: awareness on the level that we already do now for
Speaker 1: hurricane preparedness, radio, television, p s as, billboards and bus
Speaker 1: shelter ads in the targeted zip codes that I mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: all in English, Spanish, Haitian creole. And listen to our
Speaker 1: stakeholders with lived experience about where get their information. When
Speaker 1: we come back to my conversation with the heat officers continues,
Speaker 1: you had mentioned that it's had a lot of the
Speaker 1: time where you are, but for you and for your
Speaker 1: colleagues in other places where you know there are more seasons, UM,
Speaker 1: do you find it's harder to do your jowin it's
Speaker 1: cold outside? We just work on the infrastructure, then, you know,
Speaker 1: because we're not only working on communications, we're working on policy.
Speaker 1: I don't work alone or in a silo. The main
Speaker 1: goal of my office is to unsilo the city UM
Speaker 1: in terms of making partnerships with the Emergency Management Department,
Speaker 1: the Public Works Department, the Department of Water and Power.
Speaker 1: And while we're not out there conveying and communicating, we're
Speaker 1: in here building policies and grants for bringing more funds
Speaker 1: to create the infrastructure that we need to protect us
Speaker 1: and to get a small climate adopted. Martin California passed
Speaker 1: a law that says that you are going to start
Speaker 1: naming and ranking heat waves similar to the way hurricanes
Speaker 1: are named. Um, what does this has of that? What
Speaker 1: does that actually do well? I think the goal of
Speaker 1: to help convey and communicate how severe the heat wave
Speaker 1: will be to everyday people without getting too technical, Like
Speaker 1: you know, we just had herricane Fiona here, it could
Speaker 1: be heat wave Fiona, and we know when there's a
Speaker 1: Cat three hurricane coming up, we know what we need
Speaker 1: to do, the supplies we need to put in place,
Speaker 1: the evacuation plans we need to put in place. We
Speaker 1: know that you don't expect someone to go out and
Speaker 1: deliver a pizza during that time, But do you expect
Speaker 1: someone to deliver that pizza during a heat wave? Yes,
Speaker 1: and that could put them under risk. So I think
Speaker 1: that's the idea where a heat wave is. It gives
Speaker 1: people clear understanding of what actions you need to take
Speaker 1: under these more extreme conditions. And now I think the
Speaker 1: challenges making the leap and letting people know that extreme
Speaker 1: heat is our primary climate hazard. Yes, while sea level
Speaker 1: rise storm served hurricanes as a risk, actually extreme heat
Speaker 1: is the number one cause of death there are more
Speaker 1: heat officers. We're talking about small numbers overall, but more
Speaker 1: heat officers overseas. Then in the US, do you coordinate
Speaker 1: with him a lot of do you share tips? I
Speaker 1: had a chance to talk to a Lenny Malvelli from Athens, Greece,
Speaker 1: and she simplified the process for me. When you speak
Speaker 1: from the heart, and which she did, and when you
Speaker 1: speak with passion about the work that you're doing and
Speaker 1: you simplify it, I think that's the best way to
Speaker 1: convey what you're trying to say. But also influll change.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being here and taking so
Speaker 1: much time. This is just fascinating. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for having us. Thanks for listening to us here at
Speaker 1: The Big Take. It's the daily podcast from Bloomberg and
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. For more shows from my Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen. Read today's story and subscribe to our daily
Speaker 1: newsletter at Bloomberg dot com slash Big Take, and we'd
Speaker 1: love to hear from you. Email us with questions or
Speaker 1: comments to Big Take at Bloomberg dot net. The supervising
Speaker 1: producer of The Big Take is Vicky Burgalina Our senior
Speaker 1: producer is Katherine Fink. Our producer is Rebecca Chasson. Our
Speaker 1: associate producer is sam Goa Bauer. Hilda Garcia is our engineer.
Speaker 1: Original music by Leo Sidrin. I'm west Kosova. We'll be
Speaker 1: back tomorrow with another big take. Four