Urban Heat Resource Directory

The past eight years have been the hottest on record. Extreme heat is greatly affecting human health and the economy worldwide and urban areas are particularly at risk of extreme heat. The number of cities exposed to extreme temperatures will nearly triple over the next decades. By 2050, more than 970 cities will experience average summertime temperature highs of 35˚C (95°F). With trends of rapid urbanization, aging populations, and increased temperatures, the risk posed by extreme heat will only increase. 

The magnitude of future impacts from extreme heat will largely depend on global mitigation efforts, local heat governance, and response plans.

Cities have a unique potential to adapt to changing heat risks through effective risk management at multiple levels within a city, connecting policies and incentives, and strengthening community adaptation capacity. 

The Urban Heat Resource Directory is a compilation of existing tools, information, and guidance documents on urban heat resilience, aiming to support Alliance country teams with their urban programming approaches. Various different topics around urban heat resilience are covered, ranging from understanding, assessing, to building urban heat resilience. This Directory is not meant to be a one-size-fits-all, but serves as an entry point for country teams to pick and take what is useful for each.

The Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance is a multi-sectoral partnership powered by the Z Zurich Foundation, focused on enhancing resilience to climate hazards in both rural and urban communities. By implementing solutions, promoting good practice, influencing policy, and facilitating systemic change, we aim to ensure that all communities facing climate hazards are able to thrive. Find out more:  www.ZCRAlliance.org .

Several key themes have emerged from our work on community flood resilience over the past ten years. These areas reflect our technical expertise and community knowledge across multiple countries and regions. The Urban & Heat theme developed this directory to support practitioners in accessing the broad range of resources available on these topics.

Heat is rising across the globe, leading to a range of societal impacts. These are 8 key reports to understand the basics of heatwaves, their risks and impacts on a global scale:

The main platform for all heat related information is the Global Heat Health Information Network (GHHIN). Explore their website and browse through reports, projects, case-studies, and masterclasses.

You can also submit your heat-related projects, tools, or events so others across the network can learn from it:  https://ghhin.org/contribute/ 

For heat-related definitions, check out GHHIN's  glossary .

Online tool 1: Select your city and plot the temperature change from 1850 - 2022 as a bar or stripe graph. For example, this graph shows temperature change in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso since 1886 - 2022.

Online tool 2: How will your local area warm in the future? Click on the map to learn about past, present and future warming.

The  Heat Action Platform  by Arsht-Rockefeller Resilience Council provides comprehensive guidance, resources, and tools related to heat adaptation and action planning for cities. Explore  Module 1 - 3  on how to conduct a heat risk assessment, identify vulnerable communities, and assess awareness and risk perception of heat in your city.

Other tools and guides:

C40's guide on conducting a comprehensive climate change risk assessment:

C40's Excel-based  Heat Resilient Cities benefits tool  has been designed to help city planners and decision-makers to quantify the health, economic and environmental benefits of common urban heat adaptation actions:

This World Bank report (2012) proposes a framework for carrying out an urban risk assessment, and seeks to strengthen coherence and consensus on how cities can plan for natural disasters and climate change, and includes a range of case-studies. The Urban Risk Assessment (URA) was developed by drawing on lessons from existing efforts to assess risk in cities as well as urban planning literature:

The 6th IPCC Assessment Report states with high confidence that adaptation for future extreme heat risks include Heat Health Action Plans with incorporated Heat Health Warning Systems.

Policy Tool

Use Arsht-Rock's Policy Tool to access over 90 solutions for buildings, communication and outreach, green and natural infrastructure, and planning and policy strategies.

Integrating heat solutions into existing plans

The  Plan Integration for Resilience Scorecard™ (PIRS™) for Heat  is an approach that communities can use to analyze how heat mitigation policies are integrated into different plans and to identify opportunities to better target heat mitigation policies in high heat risk areas:

Policy briefs on extreme heat

Policy briefs on extreme heat for two cities in Nepal and Bangadesh based on a detailed analysis of the national and local level policies, which suggest actions that might be taken by the cities to improve resilience and preparedness around extreme heat events in the future:

Other solutions:

"During heat extremes, cooling strategies that are low cost, accessible and sustainable can be implemented at the individual level to reduce physiological heat strain. Strategies to cool the person instead of the surrounding air can be effective even in low-resource settings. This graphic explores the benefits and limits of different strategies." - Lancet, 2021

Learn how to prepare, prevent, and treat heat-related illnesses (available in multiple languages):

Preparing for extreme heat through simulation or tabletop exercises:

Learn more from  diverse examples  in Canada, the  toolkit  for NYC Emergency Management, or  this practical guide  for community-based disaster planning (on heat from p.18).

Heat awareness campaigns have been done by local Red Cross branches and others around the world to raise awareness on extreme heat. For example,  download  the social media posters in Bengali and other languages and use them for your campaign.

Or sign up to participate in  Heat Action Day , a global day for raising awareness of heat risks and sharing simple ways to #BeatTheHeat.

 Check out WHO resources on heat : publications, news, and infographics related to extreme heat.

Part of C40 and led by the City of Athens, is the  Cool Cities Network , ​which have prioritised focus areas around which they are actively sharing policies and strategies on urban heat resilience with one another.

How to: Follow  Module 6  of Arsht-Rock's Heat Action Platform to identify sources of funding and financing for heat action!

Find other opportunities through:

Check out  GHHIN's map  for updated case-studies per country: