Heatwaves and Your Wellbeing: How OpenWeather tackles this Rising Threat in a Warming World

Heatwaves, once considered a fleeting summer discomfort, are evolving into a formidable force with far-reaching consequences. As our planet continues to warm, these periods of extreme heat are becoming more frequent, more intense, and more disruptive. From the risk to human health to straining critical infrastructure and upsetting the delicate balance of ecosystems, heatwaves pose an increasing challenge in many areas.

Causes of Heatwaves

Heatwaves are mainly caused by large-scale weather patterns, such as high-pressure systems that trap hot air in a particular region. Climate change exacerbates this phenomenon by increasing their frequency, intensity, and duration. The burning of fossil fuels and other human activities release greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere, trapping heat and contributing to global warming, exacerbating the phenomenon.

How OpenWeather is helping heatwave research

OpenWeather is committed to providing accurate and accessible weather data to support those involved in research and study. We recognize the vital role weather data plays in understanding and reducing the impact of extreme weather events, such as heatwaves, and have supported two outstanding projects in this field:

A multidisciplinary approach to studying the relationship between heatwaves and population health- University of Napoli “Parthenope”

- Dr. Vincenzo Alfano and Prof. Alessandro Scaletti

A recent study in the Campania region of Italy revealed a significant correlation between heatwaves and emergency department (ED) visits. The threshold at which we observe an increase in ED visits is three consecutive days of perceived temperature (taking into account both temperature and humidity) over 39°C.

The findings of the research could be important for public health and policy, especially as the frequency and intensity of heatwaves are expected to rise due to climate change.

The study found that by incorporating weather data into the public health infrastructure, we can:

• Optimize Resource Allocation: Predict periods of high demand in EDs, allowing hospitals to adjust staffing levels.
• Launch Public Health Campaigns: Educate the public on preventive measures during heatwaves.
• Improve Infrastructure Resilience: Invest in cooling measures within hospitals to handle increased patient numbers.
• Protect Vulnerable Populations: Focus on those most susceptible to heat-related health issues.

OpenWeather Solutions

Due to the safety critical nature of public health systems, a tailored and specific alerting system could notify key public health departments and government organizations as to the nature and impact of a forthcoming heatwave. OpenWeather provides a customized alerting solution based on collaboration with OpenWeather experts that work to your specific needs.

A Need for Clarity - Heatwave Classification

Koos de Boer and Halbe Hibma

Koos de Boer, a dedicated weather enthusiast, focussed on mitigating global warming, from Schagen, the Netherlands.

Halbe Hibma - With a background in both life sciences and physics, he chose to become a physics teacher. Working with young people has fueled his passion for addressing climate change and the significant challenges it presents for future generations.

As heatwaves are becoming more frequent and severe due to climate change, posing significant threats to human health, infrastructure, and ecosystems. A standardized system for classifying heatwaves is urgently needed to better understand, communicate, and respond to the diverse impacts of these extreme weather events.

Why a Classification System Matters:

• Human Health: Heatwaves lead to heat-related illnesses and deaths, particularly among vulnerable populations. A clear system can help with early warnings and tailored public health responses.
• Infrastructure: Power grids, transportation, and water supplies can be stressed and damaged by extreme heat. A classification system helps with infrastructure planning and resilience.
• Ecosystems: Heatwaves disrupt plant and animal life, leading to biodiversity loss, agricultural problems, and increased wildfires. Understanding heatwave severity helps with conservation efforts.
• Communication: A common language for heatwave severity is essential for public awareness, policy decisions, and emergency preparedness.

Introducing the UTCI

The Universal Thermal Climate Index (UTCI) is a comprehensive measure of how environmental conditions affect human comfort and health, using temperature, humidity, wind speed, and solar radiation. This makes it a powerful tool for assessing the impact of a heatwave.

Categories and Thresholds

The proposed heatwave categories and their corresponding UTCI thresholds are as follows:

• Cat 0 - No Heatwave: Conditions within the normal range, indicating no significant heat stress (Below 26).
• Cat 1 - Moderate Heat Stress: Conditions associated with mild to moderate heat stress (26 to 32).
• Cat 2 - Strong Heat Stress: Conditions indicating strong heat stress with potential health risks (32 to 38).
• Cat 3 - Very Strong Heat Stress: Conditions characterized by very strong heat stress, posing a high risk of heat-related health issues (38 to 46).
• Cat 4 - Extreme Heat Stress: Extremely hazardous conditions with an imminent threat to health and well-being (46 and above).

The categories mentioned above apply to the average person between 18 and 55 years old. Koos de Boer and Halbe Hibma’s vision is to create a comprehensive warning system based on the Universal Thermal Climate Index(UTCI). Since each age group experiences heat differently, they propose expanding the UTCI categories to include the following groups: 0-5 years, 6-18 years, 55-65 years, and 65+ years. The current UTCI classification does not account for the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect, despite most people living in cities.

They have developed a working prototype that calculates the expected UTCI and UTCI + UHI effect hourly for the next five days, based on the input of a city name (worldwide) and an estimate of the city's population. They are grateful to OpenWeather for providing the necessary meteorological data. However, this is just the beginning of their journey. They are actively working to expand this program for different age groups.

Their vision is a program that requires only the following input: age group, city name, and an estimate of population size. The output will be the expected UTCI, UTCI + UHI, WetBulb temperature, and WetBulb temperature + UHI per hour for the next five days. This will provide a solid basis for authorities, care centers, sports organizations, etc., to make informed decisions regarding heat stress mitigation measures.

It should be noted that although a heat wave is arbitrarily defined in scientific literature, the classification that Koos de Boer and Halbe Hibma developed works solely on the parameters defined in the UTCI (plus it envelops the extra warming caused by the Urban Heat Island effect).

OpenWeather provided the necessary meteorological data, which the program retrieved via an API key. They welcome any comments and suggestions. For those interested in further details, please contact OpenWeather.

OpenWeather Education Initiatives

The support that OpenWeather has offered these vital projects builds on the OpenWeather student initiative, which gives those in education and research free and open access to detailed and nuanced weather data, powered by the OpenWeather model. This is part of the OpenWeather commitment to making weather data accessible to all, and encouraging individuals and groups to explore the wide range of uses that it can be put to.

Another example of the OpenWeather commitment to supporting those in education was the OpenWeather Challenge, an exciting and thought-provoking competition that promoted innovative uses of meteorological data for real-world applications.

OpenWeather Solutions

Understanding the historic nature of heatwaves can be an invaluable tool in being able to understand their nature, frequency, location and intensity. In addition to the bespoke solutions OpenWather offers, we also supply instantly accessible products that can be used to provide researchers, government organizations and health authorities nuanced, accurate and global historic weather data:

• The OpenWeather One Call API 3.0 provides a weather a daily aggregation of weather data for 45 years archive (as well as 1.5 years ahead forecast).

• In addition, the OpenWeather History Bulk can be used to extract hourly historical weather data for over 45 years, for any chosen location or coordinate, and includes 15 weather parameters.

The OpenWeather customizable alerts system provides timely notifications for impending heatwaves, allowing you to take proactive measures. Whether you're a city official preparing public cooling centers or an individual planning outdoor activities, our alerts will help you stay informed.

Heatwaves are becoming more frequent and severe due to climate change. They pose significant risks to human health, infrastructure, and ecosystems. OpenWeather offers the tools and data to help understand, predict, and reduce these impacts.

About OpenWeather:

OpenWeather provides weather data for any location on the globe using a proprietary hyperlocal forecasting model with a resolution from 500 m to 2 km, globally. More than 6,000,000 customers from logistics, agriculture, insurance, energy, retail, and many other sectors, are working with the company's weather products.

OpenWeather cooperates with global meteorological agencies such as MetOffice and NOAA, and enhances its model with data from radars, weather stations and satellites. The company provides great availability of service at 99.9% for enterprise-level products.

The products can be easily integrated into complex IT systems and are ideal for ML analytic systems. OpenWeather is a member of Royal Meteorological Society and an Achilles-certified supplier. OpenWeather ethical initiatives include support of educators and students, not-for-profit subscriptions for the general public to increase weather awareness, and recent Ukrainian donation programme.

For more information on how to gain access to our OpenWeather products, please email us.

Dr. Vincenzo Alfano holds the position of Assistant Professor in Political Economy at the DISEGIM Department of University of Napoli Parthenope. He has broad research interests, going from health economics and public health to the economic impact of religion and sports economics. He is also associate to Institute for the Mediterranean of the Italian National Research Council, to the Center for Economic Studies – CESifo, is research fellow for Global Labour Organization– GLO, and fellow for Italy’s National University Centre for Applied Economic Studies - CiMET.

Prof. Alessandro Scaletti is a Full Professor at the DISAE Department of University of Napoli Parthenope. His research activity mainly focuses on Public Administration and management accounting.