Keeping Cities Cool in a Warmer Future

Bold Names

The Wall Street Journal

Technology

4.4 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 14 June 2024

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

2023 was the world’s hottest year on record, and temperatures are expected to continue heating up. Cities, where more than half of the world lives, are contending with this extreme heat. But some places, such as Singapore, are looking for ways to modify aspects of their cities to make them more comfortable for people to live. The Cooling Singapore project is creating a hyper detailed digital twin of the city-state to be able to test the effectiveness of new methods the city would want to implement. WSJ’s Alex Ossola explains what they’ve learned, and how it can help us understand how more cities in the future might make changes to combat heat. What do you think about the show? Let us know on Apple Podcasts or Spotify , or email us: [email protected] Sign up for the WSJ's free The Future of Everything newsletter. Further reading: Cooing Singapore project 2023 Was the Hottest Year on Record Earth Just Had Its Hottest Month Ever. How Six Cities Are Coping. How Reflective Paint Brings Down Scorching City Temperatures These Photos Show How Urban Growth Fuels Extreme Heat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:15.0	slash W.S.J.
0:17.0	Connie, Connie, you want to go outside? Is that right?
0:23.0	Okay honey well I'd like to but it's it's very very hot.
0:30.0	John Emont is a Wall Street Journal reporter based in Singapore. He says overall he likes living there, but one thing he's had to learn to grapple with, it's really hot.
0:40.0	This is just another morning in Singapore. It's 10 a.m. It's already
0:44.4	sweltering. The humidity is kind of crazy. We're sweating like crazy. We just
0:50.6	stepped outside a minute ago.
0:53.0	In the five years he's lived there, John has noticed
0:55.3	that it's just gotten hotter.
0:56.9	He has to plan his day, when to walk his dog,
0:59.4	when to take his kid to the playground,
1:01.1	around when it's cool enough to be outside.
1:03.2	It feels a little bit like we're living on Venus and just trying to find the hours
1:09.6	and the day when the clouds come out, the sun goes away or the breeze starts up that we can rush out and
1:16.8	get our kids a little exercise and a little sort of healthy sunlight.
1:25.0	Located about one degree north of the equator, Singapore has a total area of only 278 square miles,
1:29.0	slightly smaller than New York City's five boroughs.
	...

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