Hazards SEES: Enhancing Emergency Preparedness for Critical Infrastructure Failure during Extreme Heat Events

极端高温是美国与天气有关的死亡的主要原因之一。电动空调可以减少热暴露，从而保护人体健康。由于需求增加和更频繁的恶劣天气，停电变得越来越普遍。随着气候变化，预计会出现更频繁和更强烈的热浪，因此未来的停电可能会对公众健康造成重大风险，特别是对儿童，老年人和穷人。在热浪期间，为停电紧急情况做好准备并减少危害可能对健康有重要的好处。这项研究估计了亚特兰大、底特律和凤凰城同时发生的热浪和停电事件对人类健康的风险，并研究了减少极端高温影响的具体行动的潜在好处，包括环境变化、技术改进和行为改变。区域气候、建筑物内部热暴露和人类健康影响的模型结合联合收割机来模拟热浪和电网停电情景下的人类热暴露，量化与热相关的疾病，并评估个人和机构适应性策略的潜力，以减轻极端高温的影响。该项目估计了在极端高温期间停电对人类健康的风险，这已经对公众健康造成了严重影响。这项研究的成果通过开发一种测量室内热暴露的新方法来推动科学进步，并通过测试发电，被动冷却和行为适应来增强国民健康，以在极端天气危害期间保护健康。这项研究进一步支持开发新的协议，应急响应规划有关热风险监测和疏散。 该项目的目标是估计在亚特兰大，底特律和凤凰城的热浪条件下模拟电网故障事件相关的死亡率和发病率，以应对当前和未来的气候条件，并评估特定的环境，技术和行为适应在减轻日益严重的热危害的有效性。这些城市是根据其不同的气候、人口和城市形态特征而选择的。该研究利用修改后的健康影响函数来捕获并发热浪和电网故障事件对死亡率和发病率的影响。通过区域气候和建筑能源模型的联系，结合每个地区的住宅建筑存量和电网基础设施的信息，该研究评估了应急准备和减灾战略的相对效益，这些战略来自几个不同的领域：城市气候学，建筑学，电气工程，公共卫生和城市社会学。这项研究支持在三个主要领域提高知识和方法创新。首先，开发一种新的热暴露指标-个人经历的温度（IET）-首次实现了对热暴露日常模式的热风险进行个性化评估。通过对分类建筑类型的居住者的环境和室内温度和湿度进行监测，结合通过可穿戴传感器收集的数据，将有可能在健康影响功能中用个体化的热暴露测量代替区域环境温度观测，从而改善热风险的量化。 IET的测量进一步使得能够量化在电网故障期间，当空调系统无法操作时，热病的升高风险。其次，区域气候和建筑能源模型的整合将使环境，技术和行为的适应性假设，以减少IET评估。比热适应性测试直接为地方和州政府的应急准备和减灾规划提供信息。最后，收集的调查数据对极端高温的行为反应扩大了我们的理解，如何与变量访问连续空调的人群科普极端高温的条件，并提供了一个基础，以确定和促进有效的个人适应。

Extreme heat is among the leading causes of weather-related deaths in the US. Electrically-powered air conditioning can reduce heat exposure and thus protect human health. Due to rising demand and more frequent severe weather, electrical blackouts have become increasingly common. More frequent and intense heat waves are expected with climate change, so future blackouts may result in significant risks to public health, especially among children, the elderly, and the poor. Being prepared for blackout emergencies and reducing hazards may have important health benefits during heat waves. This research estimates the human health risk of concurrent heat wave and blackout events in the cities of Atlanta, Detroit, and Phoenix and examines the potential benefits of specific actions to reduce the impacts of extreme heat, including environmental changes, technological improvements, and behavioral changes. Models of regional climate, building interior heat exposure, and human health effects combine to simulate human heat exposure under heat wave and electrical grid blackout scenarios, quantify heat-related illness, and evaluate the potential for individual and institutional adaptive strategies to lessen the impacts of extreme heat. This project estimates the human health risk of blackouts during periods of extreme heat, which already take a heavy toll on public health. The outcomes of this research advances the progress of science through the development of a new approach to measuring indoor heat exposure and enhances national health through the testing of electrical generation, passive cooling, and behavioral adaptations to protect health during extreme weather hazards. This research further supports the development of new protocols for emergency response planning pertaining to heat risk monitoring and evacuation. The goals of this project are to estimate mortality and morbidity associated with simulated grid failure events during heat wave conditions in the cities of Atlanta, Detroit, and Phoenix in response to current and future climate conditions, and to assess the effectiveness of specific environmental, technological, and behavioral adaptations in mitigating a growing heat hazard. These cities were chosen for their different climatic, demographic, and urban form profiles. The research makes use of a modified health impact function to capture the effects of concurrent heat wave and grid failure events on mortality and morbidity. Through the linking of regional climate and building energy models, in combination with information on the residential building stock and grid infrastructure in each region, the study assesses the relative benefits of emergency preparedness and hazard mitigation strategies drawn from several distinct fields: urban climatology, architecture, electrical engineering, public health, and urban sociology. The study supports the advancement of knowledge and methodological innovation in three principal areas. First, the development of a new heat exposure metric - individual experienced temperature (IET) - enables for the first time an individualized assessment of heat risk responsive to daily patterns of heat exposure. Through the monitoring of both ambient and indoor temperature and humidity for occupants of classified building types, in combination with data collected through wearable sensors, it will be possible to substitute individualized measures of heat exposure for regional ambient temperature observations in health impact functions, improving the quantification of heat risk. Measurement of IET further enables quantification of the elevated risk of heat illness during periods of grid failure, when air conditioning systems are inoperable. Second, the integration of regional climate and building energy models will enable assessment of environmental, technological, and behavioral adaptations hypothesized to reduce IET. The testing of specific heat adaptations directly informs emergency preparedness and hazard mitigation planning undertaken by local and state governments. Finally, the collection of survey data on behavioral responses to extreme heat expands our understanding of how populations with variable access to continuous air conditioning cope with conditions of extreme heat and provides a basis to identify and promote effective personal adaptations.