Survivability under Overheating - The Impact of Regional and Global Climate Change on Vulnerable and Low Income Population

Dear Colleagues,

Urban overheating is a serious problem for the whole world. Although the so-called urban heat island phenomenon has been known for more than 100 years, the rapid urbanization combined with a continuous increase of the produced and released anthropogenic heat in cities has intensified the magnitude of the phenomenon and aggravated the impact on energy, the environment, comfort, and health. In addition, global climate change, causing an important increase in the frequency, magnitude, and duration of extreme heat events, seems to intensify the magnitude of the UHI phenomenon, especially during the period of heat waves because of the important synergetic effects.

Energy poverty refers to the conditions where households are not able to cover their basic energy needs. Energy poverty is very strongly related to energy conditions and characteristics and the local climate change. Houses of low energy quality, not well protected and presenting a high energy consumption, are a serious burden for low-income populations, as the required budget to satisfy proper indoor temperature conditions is usually high and cannot be afforded by the family income. In parallel, it is well known that low-income populations mainly live in quite deprived and degraded urban areas, where the phenomenon of the urban heat island is quite strong. Higher summer outdoor temperatures increase the vulnerability of the low-income population and put their health conditions under stress.

The development of appropriate mitigation and adaptation technologies to upgrade the environmental and climatic conditions in deprived urban zones and improve the energy performance and indoor environmental quality of low-income households seems to be the most important technological response to the problem.

The proposed Special Issue aims to cover the following subjects :

• Surveys and experimental data from low-income households during overheating conditions;
• Survivability analysis under current and future conditions for low-income households;
• Energy poverty data and analysis;
• Energy, health, comfort, IAQ, and economic issues related to overheated households;
• Development and implementation of appropriate mitigation technologies for deprived urban areas;
• Development and implementation of advanced low-cost adaptation technologies and strategies for low-income houses;
• Analysis of the interaction and impact of global and regional climate change in deprived urban zones;
• Case studies on mitigation and adaptation policies to alleviate energy poverty;
• Energy market transformation and policies that influence energy poverty;
• Case studies on the use of renewable technologies by low-income populations;
• Global challenges for the future: Energy security, climate change, and energy poverty;
• Thermal adaptation and physiology of acclimation in low-income populations during overheating conditions.

Dr. Afroditi Synnefa
Dr. Shamila Haddad
Dr. Priya Rajagopalan
Prof. Matthaios Santamouris
Guest Editors

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