Thermal Assessment Tool​

Figure 11: Panel that shows the historical heatwaves of a specific region (e.g. Logroño) Source: Tecnalia

Tool description

Climate change is leading to an increase in the frequency and intensity of heatwave events across the globe.The Thermal Assessment Tool (TAT) assesses and visualizes the thermal behavior of regions and cities in Europe during episodes of extreme heat to better understand this phenomena to improve the adaptative capacity and support climate adaptation plans.The tool provides the frequency and severity of past, present and future extreme heat episodes under intermediate (RCP4.5) and very high (RCP8.5) emissions scenarios at different regional scales (municipality, province and/or autonomous community). The tool characterizes the magnitude of these extreme heatwave events in Europe based on different risk levels (warning, alert, alarm), which were defined based on the severity of their potential impacts.

 

 

Complexity

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Complexity explanation

An online version of Thermal Assessment Tool is freely available to visualize past and future heatwave plots. The tool is based on the independent and authoritative Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) datasets. The complexity of using the tool is low.

Note: This first online version of the Thermal Assessment Tool is including the heatwave service, but not the heatmaps service which has been developed offline so far.

Benefits of using the tool

The tool allows end-users and decision makers to easily visualize how long, intense and frequent extreme heat events will be in the coming decades considering the intermediate (RCP4.5) and very high (RCP8.5) emissions scenarios. This raises awareness for citizens and supports governments to prepare and protect the city through effective policy making.

City Hub experiences

Logroño is using the tool to plan future city interventions and as an input for the SECAP. Logroño has also included the outcomes of the tool in their climate story to raise awareness in citizens on heatwaves impacts which are becoming more frequent and intense in the city.

Milano is interested in the regional perspective of the tool outcomes and prevision for the future as well for planning for energy community. Milano has also included some outcomes of the tool in their climate story to better visualize future impacts.

Athens is interested in heatwaves projections and heatmaps to determine those areas of higher surface heat concentration.

Triple-A phases

The tool can be used in the following Triple-A phase:

  • Analysis phase: to support the heat hazard assessment considering the intermediate (RCP4.5) and very high (RCP8.5) emissions scenario’s.

 

Guidance

Not available yet

Contact

Tecnalia

Joshua Lizunda Loiola, joshua.lizundia@tecnalia.com

Nieves Peña Cerezo, nieves.pena@tecnalia.com

 

More information at

Complementarity

The Thermal Assessment Tool works specially well in combination with the Social Vulnerability tool to assess and visualize the risk considering heat hazard and heat related social vulnerability.

The integration with the CRCTool will also be tested to integrate heat stress map layers to support effective locations for interventions.

 

The climate story of Gdynia​

Short summary: A story about Jan and Maria during extreme precipitation.

Theme: Flooding

End user: Citizens

Link to the story: under construction