The latest las Olas heat waves that the capital city has suffered are clear signs of what meteorologists and researchers have been reporting for years. It sounds like a nightmare, but it is not: NASA warns that, in 2050, Madrid will be uninhabitable in July and August due to extreme temperatures. It won’t be the only community where this will happen: Castilla-La Mancha, Valencia and Andalucía will also be affected by the phenomenon ‘heat island‘.
what is the wet bulb temperature?
According to the study Too Hot To Handle measuring the wet bulb temperature is the key to assessing whether or not an area of the planet will be habitable in the next 30 years. NASA explains that this measurement tests “the human body’s ability to cool itself by sweating in hot and humid weather” and “indicates whether weather conditions can be unhealthy or even deadly.”
The wet bulb thermometer should never exceed 35°C, since, according to Raymond’s team (NASA), “unce this figure is passed, no amount of sweating or other adaptive behavior is sufficient to reduce the body to a safe operating temperature.” The problem is that places with subtropical climates such as the Persian Gulf and Pakistan have already recorded higher figures, and in Western countries such as the United States and Spain we are on the same path.
In Madrid, it is already known that the concentration of buildings and asphalt in certain districts of the capital (Centro, Vallecas…) will aggravate the effect of urban heat islands. These, according to the daily Mortality Monitoring system (MoMo), have resulted in thousands of deaths between 2022 and 2024. In 2030, the phenomenon will be prolonged in time. Although this will occur in other large cities in Spain such as Valencia, Madrid is more vulnerable than the rest due to its population density and urban activity.
On the other hand, according to a study by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH-Zurich), Madrid will reach temperatures similar to those in Morocco at present, which will rise by an average of 6.4ºC during the hottest months of the year
Possible solutions
Although NASA’s predictions are pessimistic, there are some initiatives that could turn the forecast around: implementing Verde zones, building infrastructure that insulates heat instead of retaining it, and promoting greenhouse gas reduction. It is also necessary for the population to have resources such as weather shelters in case of emergency.