We can't air-condition our way out of the global heating problem: UN heat officer

{ELENI MYRIVILI} GLOBAL CHIEF HEAT OFFICER FOR UN-HABITAT AND SENIOR ADVISOR TO ADRIENNE ARSHT-ROCKEFELLER FOUNDATION RESILIENCE CENTRE

- Shivani Singh

In 2023, atmospheric heat crossed some of its critical thresholds even as countries continued to grapple with fundamental questions about its dangers. How do we measure extreme heat stress and its impact on human health and well-being, society, ecology and economy? How can we deal with the consequences it has for countries such as India that are already facing income, spatial, and resource inequalities?

To understand the scale of the challenge, Hindustan Times spoke to Eleni Myrivili, the first global chief heat officer for the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) and senior advisor to the US-based Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Centre.

In 2022, the two organisations announced a collaboration and created this position to mainstream heat response and resilience-building actions in cities worldwide.

Myrivili has hands-on experience in this field, having previously served as Athens's chief heat officer and the city's deputy mayor for 'urban nature, urban resilience, and climate adaptation. Edited excerpts from the interview:

Heat is a silent killer. It's difficult to tell when and how it gets deadly, especially in warmer countries such as India where high temperatures are understood to be a normal seasonal occurrence. So how do we then assess the threat?

We know that the trends are becoming more intense and (moving) faster than we expected. Last year was the hottest year ever recorded. It broke a series of previous thresholds of extreme temperatures, including the surface of the ocean, and the hottest day ever. On November 17, the average temperatures around the globe were 2°C above (the preindustrial levels). It was the first time that we broke the ceiling of two degrees (set in the 2015 Paris Agreement).