Huang, Wan Ting Katty;
Masselot, Pierre;
Bou-Zeid, Elie;
Fatichi, Simone;
Paschalis, Athanasios;
Sun, Ting;
Gasparrini, Antonio;
(2023)
Economic valuation of temperature-related mortality attributed to urban heat islands in European cities.
Nature Communications
, 14
, Article 7438. 10.1038/s41467-023-43135-z.
Preview |
Text
s41467-023-43135-z.pdf - Published Version Download (1MB) | Preview |
Abstract
As the climate warms, increasing heat-related health risks are expected, and can be exacerbated by the urban heat island (UHI) effect. UHIs can also offer protection against cold weather, but a clear quantification of their impacts on human health across diverse cities and seasons is still being explored. Here we provide a 500 m resolution assessment of mortality risks associated with UHIs for 85 European cities in 2015-2017. Acute impacts are found during heat extremes, with a 45% median increase in mortality risk associated with UHI, compared to a 7% decrease during cold extremes. However, protracted cold seasons result in greater integrated protective effects. On average, UHI-induced heat-/cold-related mortality is associated with economic impacts of €192/€ − 314 per adult urban inhabitant per year in Europe, comparable to air pollution and transit costs. These findings urge strategies aimed at designing healthier cities to consider the seasonality of UHI impacts, and to account for social costs, their controlling factors, and intra-urban variability.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Economic valuation of temperature-related mortality attributed to urban heat islands in European cities |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1038/s41467-023-43135-z |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-43135-z |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science > Dept of Civil, Environ and Geomatic Eng UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Inst for Risk and Disaster Reduction |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10181614 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
