The white roofs cooling women's homes in Indian slums

To address shade inequality and rising heat deaths, the American Forests launched a digital tool in 2021 that scores geographic areas based on tree canopy and surface temperature, as well as other factors such as income, employment, race, age and health. It then calculates a Tree Equity Score and maps out the regions that have the greatest need for trees. With this information, Tucson aims to plant one million trees by 2030, and has already planted 120,000 over the past four years.

The Center of Contemporary Culture of Barcelona is a key part of the city’s growing climate shelter network, which has expanded from 70 locations in 2020 to 368 last summer. The climate centers are integrated into the city’s public infrastructure — libraries, parks, museums, etc. — and have expanded to the point where 98% of the population is within a 10-minute walk from a shelter.

Vienna’s cool streets provide a safe outdoor space to escape the heat in the summer. The city used a heat map and population data to select streets with high concentrations of residents who are particularly vulnerable to extreme heat, like children and the elderly. At the selected locations, traffic was limited and asphalt was covered with turf, benches, mist machines, and water fountains. When the city challenged the project, a citizen’s initiative in the Ottakring district worked with the local council to keep one cool street open last summer, saving a public safe outdoor space.

To protect tenants from extreme heat, lawmakers in Montgomery County, Maryland, passed a policy requiring landlords to provide air conditioning capable of cooling units to at least 80 degrees Fahrenheit from June through September.

In Phoenix, Arizona, a citywide tree-planting initiative is slowly increasing canopy cover to reduce the urban heat island effect in neighborhoods that need it the most. Residents pick between several varieties of desert-adapted trees, which are planted on their property by professional arborists, and take care of them with a provided kit.

As deadly heat waves become more common, cities are looking to increase social infrastructure and community connections to keep vulnerable community members safe from the heat.

By going a step further than pollinator strips and hedgerows to create complex landscape structures, farmers create refugia with cooler microclimates that help pollinators and other animals acclimate and survive increasing temperatures.

The Oglala Sioux Tribe uses underground greenhouses to keep harvests safe from intensifying weather due to climate change and fight food insecurity in the community.

Kenyans are trading iron for grass, palm fronds, and water reeds to build roofs that keep their homes cooler during extreme heat waves.

Bulk-purchase "group-buy" programs for heat pumps have achieved 15-30% cost savings for participants, and on Gabriola Island, over 1,000 units have been installed, making carbon-free heating and cooling more accessible.