Abstract
Summertime overheating in dwellings in temperate climates is widespread. Overheating in bedrooms disrupts sleep, degrading health and wellbeing, and can be life-threatening. Air-conditioning homes is a solution, but is expensive and adds load onto electricity networks. An alternative is to provide safe havens, a cool retreat for sleeping when the main bedroom overheats. This paper estimates the number of English dwellings that might already have such spaces. The 2017 Energy Follow Up Survey (EFUS) to the English Housing Survey (EHS) provides temperatures measured in the main bedroom, up to two other bedrooms and the living room of 750 homes. These data were collected in 2018, a summer typical of those expected in the 2050s. The main bedroom overheated in 19% of the housing stock as judged by an adaptive comfort criterion. Up to 76% of these homes had living rooms that could provide a safe haven, and in up to 46% an alternative bedroom might provide a safe haven. Very few, if any, flats and small-area dwellings had a safe haven. These figures provide an upper-bound estimate; in practice the useable number of safe havens is likely to be less. <em><strong>Policy relevance</strong></em> Safe havens for use during heatwaves have been suggested as a climate-adaptive strategy to ameliorate indoor overheating. In this study, the prevalence of safe havens, which can be slept in when the main bedroom overheats, is estimated. Living rooms offered the best opportunity of a safe haven for sleeping, with 5.8 million of the 7.4 million people experiencing an overheated main bedroom being relieved of exposure. Flats and small dwellings were more prone to overheating, but few, if any, had either a living room or a spare bedroom that offered a safe haven. Overall, this study strengthens the idea that public health advice, especially during heatwaves, should be tailored to different dwelling and household types. For larger dwellings other than flats, advice could emphasise the benefits of sleeping in the living room, where possible, on hot nights. Homes without safe havens should be the focus of heat mitigation retrofit strategies.
Highlights
Buildings and CitiesThe threats posed by climate change are of worldwide concern
The analysis is conducted on the presumption that people slept in the main bedroom unless an alternative room, either living room or bedroom, was cooler
Note: The number of data points with x > 12% is stated. These results suggest that living rooms may provide a safe haven in many homes, but that the prospects of finding a safe haven in another bedroom are much more limited
Summary
High summertime temperatures are linked to excess mortality and morbidity (Arbuthnott & Hajat 2017; Hajat et al 2014; Ormandy & Ezratty 2012), and the majority of fatal heat exposures in developed nations occur indoors (Quinn et al 2014). In developed countries with hot summers, air-conditioning is widespread, but there are concerns about the summertime resilience In temperate climates there are concerns that an upsurge in use will increases the summertime loads on local and national electricity supply networks (Crawley et al 2020). The costs of buying and operating air-conditioning systems will bear most heavily on the poorest in society, introducing the prospect of summertime fuel poverty (CCC 2019a). Air-conditioning ejects waste heat into the environment contributing further to the urban heat-island effect (CCC 2019b)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
