U-ADAPT · Urban Adaptation to Extreme Heat Events
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2021-09-01 → 2023-08-31
- EU contribution
- €160,932
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Urban Adaptation to Extreme Heat Events
The U-ADAPT! project proposes a novel approach for the dynamic measuring of urban adaptation to extreme heat. Extreme Heat Events (EHE) are the deadliest weather- and climate-related hazard in Europe. In recent years, heat waves have overwhelmed the continent. For instance, the summer of 2003 saw 71,000 excess deaths across 12 countries. In the summer of 2010, another EHE claimed thousands of lives in Eastern Europe, while the 2019 European heat waves resulted in record-breaking temperatures and estimates of thousands of deaths across several countries. Projections show an alarming increase in EHE risk driven by natural and socioeconomic factors. Mitigation, adaptation, and transformative strategies need immediate implementation, but the rate of adaptation and depth of the transformation are in question. The output of this research offers a solution to evaluate the response of the cities to reduce the heat disaster risk (HDR) while also empowers citizens to audit the commitment of their cities to EHE risk reduction and reduce short- and long-term negative impacts of heat. Building on recent efforts detailing the effects of different adaptation strategies to minimize HDR, U-ADAPT! focuses on the concrete expression of adaptation to evaluate the current implementation and effectiveness of adaptation measures and strategies to reduce HDR. This is highly innovative in the field as it moves the emphasis from the study of vulnerability, resilience, and potential adaptation (adaptation capacity) of communities to the actual depth and pace of the past and current adaptation process, which creates opportunities for new insights. The lack of a comprehensive and holistic framework on adaptation to HDR and the absence of robust assessment mechanisms are likely factors of EU urban areas not successfully adapting to this threat or having implemented maladaptive practices.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
The U-ADAPT! project proposes a novel approach for the dynamic measuring of urban adaptation to extreme heat. Extreme Heat Events (EHE) are the deadliest weather- and climate-related hazard in Europe. In recent years, heat waves have overwhelmed the continent, and projections show an alarming increase in EHE risk driven by natural and socioeconomic factors . Mitigation, adaptation, and transformative strategies need immediate implementation, but the rate of adaptation and depth of the transformation are in question. Reports stress that the progress of adaptation in European cities is patchy, uncoordinated, and of varied quality. Cities are still implementing their first adaptive measures and developing ideas for monitoring and reporting adaptation strategies. However, concrete norms or indicators for adaptation monitoring are scarce. In the research sphere, adaptation has mostly been discussed in terms of adaptive capacity, rather than implementation, which is the focus of this proposal. Despite the efforts, there is still very little consensus as to what constitutes effective and adequate adaptation, and therefore little agreement about models and indicators to measure it. The scientific aim of U-ADAPT! is to advance and test a theoretical integrated framework to examine the actual implementation of adaptation strategies to the risk of EHE in urban areas of the European Union (EU), in the context of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA). The ultimate societal goal is to develop a model to assist cities in their responsibility to provide a safe and sustainable environment. The output of this research will also empower citizens to audit the commitment of their cities to EHE risk reduction and evaluate measures to reduce short- and long-term negative impacts of heat.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSIDAD PABLO DE OLAVIDE · SevillaCoordinatorSpain
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union