The risks to health, wellbeing and productivity from overheating are important climate change challenges for the UK. The UCL Institute for Environmental Design and Engineering (IEDE) at The Bartlett, UCL’s Faculty of the Built Environment, is leading a high-profile project to address such issues in care homes.
The researchers have collected temperature and humidity data in 50 care settings for the first time in the UK, to quantify the risk of summertime overheating. The ClimaCare project is also creating a building stock model of the UK’s care provision that is able to predict future overheating risks in care settings under a range of future climate change and adaptation scenarios.
The work was cited in a key Government policy paper in November 2021, as part of the government's response to a Climate Change Committee report and their recommendations on adaptation.
The ongoing ClimaCare project is being led by Professor Mike Davies at IEDE, with collaborators from Oxford Brookes and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
The project is working with the Care Quality Commission, the UK Health Security Agency, the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers, the Greater London Authority and the Department of Health and Social Care.
Professor Mike Davies explains: “This project addresses a recommendation from the UK Climate Change Committee that government should assess vulnerability to existing and future climate risks, particularly for care homes and home-based care, and then develop a cross-sector approach to address risks. ClimaCare is producing vital relevant evidence to help develop adaptation pathways to rising heat stress under climate change.”
Further resources
- UCL Institute for Environmental Design and Engineering
- ClimaCare project informs UK Government solution to climate health target
- Government response to the Climate Change Committee report on progress in adapting to climate change
Contact
Professor Mike Davies
Professor of Building Physics and the Environment, UCL Institute for Environmental Design and Engineering
Email: michael.davies@ucl.ac.uk