ENVIRONMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Athens Resilience Strategy & Heat Action Plan
With the mean temperature rising 0.5°C per year since the 1990’s, Athens is experiencing hotter and longer summers, with more frequent and intense heatwaves, which disproportionately affect vulnerable populations. As part of the Heatwave Action Plan, Athens is implementing heatwave warnings and constructing green areas with cooling spots, increasing resilience to heat and ensuring the well-being of the most at-risk residents.
Challenges addressed
• Inadequate institutional capacity: There aren’t enough people who know how to design, procure, and implement NbS and infrastructures that include natural elements instead of grey (cement and concrete).
• Lack of prioritization of climate risks
• Data gap on evaluation and impacts
• Reclaiming public space from cars and their infrastructure: Athenian urban density leaves no space for what is needed to protect the city from the new Climate Era and rising heat: a radical introduction of nature and surface water elements in the city
• Working in silos: Cross departmental and cross disciplinary collaboration is still a challenge.
Main objectives
• Building heat resilience: addressing the increasing frequency, intensity, and duration of heatwaves due to climate change, with a focus on protecting health and socio-economic stability.
• Overcoming siloed approaches: by creating coordinated strategies for heat resilience across city departments
External resources
Facts
Project type Urban Heat resilience project
Partners UN-Habitat, City of Athens government
Beneficiaries Athens municipality
Dates 2017 (Approval date)
Website Athens – Heatwave Action Plan Protects Vulnerable Residents
Project description
In 2016, along with 100 cities around the world, Athens started planning for a resilient future following the methodology of the 100 Resilient Cities initiative.
The plan aims to protect the city’s most at-risk residents, including the elderly, those with cardiovascular or respiratory conditions, infants, people with obesity problems, and energy poverty-stricken households from the adverse health threats of heatwaves. Through the coordination of municipal social services, the city is instituting projects such as increasing green areas, expanding the use of cool materials, increasing shade options, and promoting “cooling routes” in parts of the city where the urban heat island effect is more intense, ensuring that vulnerable residents are protected.
Under a strategic partnership between the city and the National Observatory of Athens, a digital heatwave warning mechanism is now available to residents via either personal computers or smartphones. The mechanism provides valuable information such as the current temperature in the user’s location, whether they are at risk depending on their age and medical condition, as well as how to reach a cooling spot in case they are indeed at risk.
Impact and results
• Environmental benefits: By cooling the city, smog and ozone concentrations above threshold limits are predicted to reduce during summer months. Furthermore, 10,000 trees were planted by 2020 under the plan, reducing the immediate surrounding temperature up to 10%.
• Social benefits: Athens hopes to reverse “urban flight” with the deployment of greening and cooling infrastructure, attracting locals, tourists, and immigrants back to the city center.
• Economic benefits: By applying measures for cooling included in the Heatwave Action Plan, Athens can reduce its energy demand in summer months by 15%.
• Health benefits: With successful awareness campaigns and proper preventive measures included in the Heatwave Action Plan, Athens aims to reduce the number of heat-related health incidents.
Publications & main documents
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