PREPARING FOR EXTREME HEAT
Creating heat-resilient communities.
Extreme heat is a major public health crisis.
Extreme heat isn’t coming––it’s here. In 2022, Boston recorded the hottest 30-day stretch in history, and saw four major heatwaves with temperatures exceeding 90 degrees for twenty-four days in 2021. By 2070, our watershed could see over 90 days of extreme temperatures each year.
Extreme heat is deadly—heat is the number one weather-related killer and it’s particularly dangerous for vulnerable populations including the elderly, children, people with pre-existing conditions, outdoor workers, and the unhoused.
And, the impacts of extreme heat are not felt equally across our watershed. Neighborhoods with lots of pavement, fewer trees, and limited access to green space and cooling centers experience temperatures up to 10 degrees hotter in the summertime compared with other neighborhoods, meaning health impacts are much more severe.
Every single person in our watershed deserves to live in a safe community––that’s why we are working to cool down neighborhoods and keep us all safe from the dangers of extreme heat.
View the Climate Ready Boston Explorer to see extreme heat disparities.
What we are doing about it:
We are building community resilience to extreme heat by advocating for increased tree canopy and open space, building green infrastructure, researching heat impacts on a watershed scale, and sharing resources and information on how to stay cool.
EXPANDING TREE CANOPY
Trees are one of our greatest climate solutions–– providing cooler neighborhoods, clean air, flood mitigation, cleaner water, and mental health benefits–– yet our watershed is losing tree canopy at an alarming rate. Since 2000, Massachusetts has lost over 3.5% of its tree cover.
Regional planning will help maximize the benefits of existing trees, help protect mature trees from invasive species, and identify new opportunities for tree planting to build a robust, healthy tree canopy.
UNDERSTANDING EXTREME HEAT
Environmental Justice communities are hit first and worst by climate change––the legacies of racist redlining policies and chronic disinvestment have left parts of our watershed with less tree canopy, parks, and green space, resulting in many Environmental Justice neighborhoods experiencing much hotter temperatures.
We are collaborating with Boston University’s Metro Bridge program to research the best ways to measure urban heat impacts in Environmental Justice communities on a watershed scale to prioritize mitigation in the places that need it most.
BUILDING GREEN INFRASTRUCTURE
We’re bringing nature back–– designing, building, and maintaining green infrastructure across our watershed to keep stormwater pollution out of our river and cool our neighborhoods.
Nature-Based Solutions like Green Infrastructure (GI) use rain gardens, bioswales, infiltration chambers, tree pits, permeable pavers, and more that collect stormwater runoff, filter out pollution, recharge the groundwater, and more.