The Climate School hosted a three-day workshop on extreme heat from July 10 to 12, bringing together experts across fields to assess current knowledge and identify cross-sectoral solutions.

The organizing committee for the workshop was co-chaired by Deepti Singh, an assistant professor at Washington State University, and Climate School professors Radley Horton and Mingfang Ting, who is also co-director of the Masters in Climate and Society program. Committee members for the workshop, titled “Emerging Risks from Concurrent, Compounding and Record-breaking Extreme Heat across Sectors,” included academics and climate experts from universities across the country.

“We believe a workshop bringing together individuals from various sectors affected by extreme heat is essential to advance our understanding of both the physical science of extreme heat and the social and behavioral aspects of how we respond to extreme heat and the impact on human health, infrastructure, agriculture, and the energy sector,” Singh, Horton, and Ting wrote in a statement to Spectator.

Singh, Horton, and Ting cited increasingly intense and frequent extreme heat events as underscoring the importance of holding this workshop. Such instances included the June 2021 Pacific Northwest heat wave and the recent surge in heat-related deaths during the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca.

Roughly 350 individuals die prematurely due to heat each summer in New York City, according to the 2024 NYC Heat-Related Mortality Report from the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The majority of these deaths are heat-exacerbated, meaning they are caused indirectly when heat aggravates an individual’s underlying illnesses. Black New Yorkers face heat-stress mortality rates two times higher than white New Yorkers, according to the same report.

Morningside Heights is scored at a 2 out of 5 on New York City’s Heat Vulnerability Index, which summarizes factors that contribute to neighborhood heat risk. Such factors include surface temperature, access to home air conditioning, green space, and the percentage of low-income or non-Latinx Black residents. Manhattanville-West Harlem is scored at a 3 out of 5, while neighboring South Harlem, North Harlem, and East Harlem are all scored at a Heat Vulnerability Index of 5—the highest risk rating.

Several community advocates in West Harlem have raised concerns over the increasingly severe extreme heat in the wake of Mayor Eric Adams’ fiscal budget, which heavily reduced funding allocated to three of West Harlem’s six cooling centers.

The Climate School’s workshop saw roughly 150 in-person attendees at The Forum, as well an additional 50 virtually, according to Singh, Horton, and Ting. Attendees participated in overview talks and research presentations in the morning sessions, semi-structured sessions focused on interdisciplinary working groups in the afternoon, and poster sessions in the evenings featuring research from students and postdocs.

Sessions at the workshop covered a wide array of topics, including the physical drivers of extreme heat, its impact on the food and energy sectors, and tools for communicating about heat risks. The workshop included two panels covering how the government, the private sector, and the nonprofit sector can plan, prepare, and adapt in the face of extreme heat.

“Adequately preparing for and building resilience to heat requires thinking about many aspects – who is affected, where are they affected, and what is the potential for these individuals to manage heat exposure, and what policies are available to protect those most vulnerable,” Singh, Horton, and Ting wrote.

As a takeaway of the workshop, Singh, Horton, and Ting emphasized the increasing awareness—among climate scientists and decision makers alike—of the severity and costliness of extreme heat. They also noted that more research is necessary on how extreme heat impacts the most vulnerable communities.

Citing the potential for future workshops, Singh, Horton, and Ting wrote that attendees “felt the workshop successfully brought people from different sectors and geographical locations together to talk about a pressing topic.”

“Extreme heat is not going away and will only get worse as we saw from this summer,” they wrote.

Staff Writer Jesse Levine can be contacted at jesse.levine@columbiaspectator.com. Follow her on X @_jesselevine.