Officials are warning that
the heatwaves gripping Europe
have only just begun.
High temperatures are expected
to persist throughout August.
And it's not a reprieve.
Italy, Spain, and Greece
really are hoping
for as they continue to face
unrelenting heat.
Temperatures in Rome reached
a record high of nearly get this.
42 degrees Celsius,
prompting officials
to work on protocols for workers
spending hours, of course,
in the sweltering heat in Greece.
Workers at the Acropolis
are striking, protesting,
having to work in the baking sun.
And temperatures are expected to reach
44 degrees Celsius
this week
and is expected to get higher next week.
While with heat
waves becoming the new normal,
the question remains
what changes
can we as a society implement
to combat the the rising temperatures.
Earlier today,
I spoke about this
with the merit of the Fletcher School
at Tufts University,
Rachel Kyte,
who has been leading action
on climate solutions.
We've got
extraordinary temperatures in the oceans
all the way up into the Arctic.
And we've seen extreme heat
across South Asia,
Southeast Asia as well.
So it's global
and it is a disaster foretold.
We've been warning about this
as scientists
have been warning us about this
and now it's here.
So extreme heat is not something
that we should be worried about.
Into the future.
We are losing people to extreme heat
today.
Let's talk policy
because I'm keen
to try and get an understanding
from viewers
because every day we cover this story.
What needs to happen
if this is indeed the new normal?
What do we need
to see
from governments here in terms of policy?
Well, first of all, urgency.
This isn't something which we can kick
the can down the road any longer.
So this means that public buildings,
our hospitals
and our schools
are going to have to be retrofitted
so that we're safe inside them.
Maybe we have to change the hours
that we study.
It means that we will have
to make available
at a price point
that low and middle
income people can afford
air conditioning
that is not
polluting in and of itself
and isn't super energy efficient.
So because we need to manage
energy demand,
it means that we have to, in the short
term, open up cooling centers
as they are doing in Phenix and Boston,
where I live,
and Seville and other countries, cities
which are on the leading edge.
A cooling center
might be a gymnasium of a school.
It might be a church basement,
but somewhere where
people can get out of the cold.
We don't have to change labor laws,
and we're beginning to see that happen.
You can't be outworking in the fields
in this kind of temperature.
So it's the way that we think about how
we do what we do
and certainly the ways that we heat
and cool
our buildings
the way we build our buildings
and the way we build our cities.
In particular,
as you said,
in the low income part of a of a city,
often it's a concrete jungle
well off live in leafy suburbs.
Talk to us about
the building of our cities, making them
greener, adapting
because you're talking about us
changing the way we live in many ways,
but also the way we
we construct buildings.
So the materials that we construct,
the way
in which we
think about how those buildings
use energy,
but also how they can actually
generate energy.
If you go to countries like Denmark
and you can also see this in Vancouver
and other places.
There are whole districts of a city
which are cooled using the water
which is right next to the building.
So you can use district cooling
to use the water
you bring up through pipes
through the building
and cool the building
by just using the difference
in temperature in the water.
So that doesn't need
massive air conditioning.
It doesn't require
enormous amounts of energy.
These technologies exist.
There are new technologies
of air conditioning,
which allow you to both dehumidifier
and cool the air at the same time.
So these technologies exist.
They're going to have to be
sped up and deployed,
you know, really quite quickly.
How expensive is all of this?
I'm thinking of developing countries.
You talked about urgency,
really,
the lack of urgencies that we have
and we haven't seen much of so far, but
for developing countries,
this is very costly.
Well, energy demand is very costly.
So some of these technologies
actually would lower energy demand.
There's nothing more demanding of energy
than everybody
running a super inefficient
window rattler.
So so
I think
some of the most exciting work over
the last few years
has been developing air conditioning,
which doesn't use pollutants
which are dangerous
and which is super efficient
and which could be purchased
at a price point
that a low income Indian family
can afford.
Now, that's
where the population is growing.
That's where the heat is most intense.
So there is a solution
that actually
could fix all of those problems.
You advise governments,
are they listening?
Are they do they see the urgency
I mean, frankly,
in the mind, no.
We're still sort of.
Well, let's review it. Let's study it.
Let's think about it.
Let's, you know,
get a panel of experts together
with we're now at that point,
surely this year
I thought we were reviewing it
five years ago.
Right. Exactly.
So now it really is about
having integrated energy policy,
which understands
the moment we're using energy
to cool ourselves,
which is often inefficient.
And which produces more heat.
And so then you've got
an even hostile environment to cool down.
So we have to actually listen
to the scientists and the engineers
who have solutions to this.
And then we're going to have to
make it possible for people
in low income and middle incomes
to be able to afford this,
that you can't just sort of say
we don't do it
because we can't afford it,
we can't afford it,
and we can progressively tax
these technologies in a way that works
in the developing world.
There are low
there are low technology solutions.
You can blow a fan over a block of ice
enough to keep one room cool.
You can use solar power
over a machine,
which will keep vaccines
safe as you deliver them
to remote villages.
So there are low tech solutions
and high tech solutions depending
on where you are.