What: Fast Company reviews the notion of heat waves and warns they should be taken with the same seriousness as hurricanes.

Why it is important: Businesses will be affected during heatwaves, for instance, e-commerce deliveries won’t be possible.

Cities urgently need to prepare for the increasing threat of heatwaves. The Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center highlights the contrast between well-established preparedness for hurricanes and the lack of similar readiness for heatwaves. July 2023 was the hottest month ever recorded, and the impact of such extreme heat is devastating: Europe saw 61,000 deaths in summer 2022 and the U.S. lost $100 billion in productivity in 2020 due to heat. This suggests that just as we don't expect deliveries during hurricanes, the same should apply in extreme heat. Proposals to increase preparedness include naming heatwaves to raise awareness, urban tree planting (as demonstrated by Freetown, Sierra Leone's initiative to plant 1 million trees), adopting cooling building materials, and creating open urban spaces for better air circulation. The UN-Habitat emphasizes that each city experiences heat differently and requires unique solutions, but all cities have vulnerable populations that need protection from heat.

Heat waves are a new part of our future