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On Palm Trees and Climate Resiliency

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A Los Angeles Times article on cities reconsidering the value of Southern California’s iconic palm trees checked in with V. Kelly Turner, associate director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation. Planting trees is a key element of many climate resiliency plans, but the towering palms don’t provide much shade or sequester carbon well. “A pole on the side of the street isn’t providing much shade. And a palm tree is kind of similar,” said Turner, whose work focuses on how cities adapt to hotter conditions. The article pointed to Center for Innovation research showing that shade can reduce heat stress in the human body from 25% to 30% throughout the day. Turner also spoke to Resources Radio about how heat impacts U.S. schools. The conversation touched on architectural and landscape design choices that can mitigate hot temperatures, funding sources for improving infrastructure and issues of equity in allocating such resources to schools. 

Read the L.A. Times article
Listen to the Resources Radio podcast

 

‘A Ticking Time Bomb’ for California’s Water Systems

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Gregory Pierce, co-executive director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about failing water systems in California, which raise the risk of serious health issues for about 1 million residents. Concern over the availability of clean drinking water has grown as drought and climate change threaten traditional sources. “It’s a bit of a ticking time bomb,” said Pierce, who directs the Human Right to Water Solutions Lab. Many water systems must take urgent steps or “they’ll be out of compliance and be failing” under new regulations that will soon be in place. The article also cited Max Gomberg MPP ’07, a consultant working with environmental justice advocates. “I think with enough resources, money, people and political will, the human right to water is absolutely achievable in California,” Gomberg said. “But it’s going to take all of that to a degree that has not been provided in the 11 years since the Human Right to Water Act was passed.”

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Mullin on ‘Glimmers of Possibility’ on Climate Action

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News outlets including Ethnic Media Services, The Hill, La Opinión and Peninsula 360 Press covered research by UCLA Luskin’s Megan Mullin about the entrenched political divide that has impeded action on climate change — as well as signals that the logjam is starting to break. “I am seeing glimmers of possibility that climate action may yet be underway even as American climate politics remains firmly in the grip of polarization,” said Mullin, professor of public policy and faculty director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, at a briefing hosted by Ethnic Media Services. Not only are Republican-led states seeing growing levels of clean-energy production, she said, but many heavily Republican areas of the country are at high risk for the worst effects of climate change. Mullin also cited the climate change literacy of younger generations, which is “leaps and bounds beyond the literacy of older generations, and that translates into smaller divides, even among young Republicans.” 

Watch the Ethnic Media Services briefing
Read the Hill article
Read the La Opinión article

 

On the Chronic, Day-to-Day Toll of Rising Temperatures

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V. Kelly Turner, associate director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, joined the podcast America Adapts for an expansive conversation on the effects of rising temperatures on public health. While record-setting heat has received widespread media coverage over the summer, Turner stressed that governments must develop not just climate emergency plans, but long-term resiliency strategies that protect people from the chronic day-to-day experience of elevated temperatures. “We talk a lot about extreme heat and we talk a lot about mortality and we talk about heat sickness, but what we don’t really talk about is the myriad ways that heat affects well-being in our daily lives. It affects your cognitive abilities, your emotional state. You’re more likely to be angry, unable to concentrate,” Turner said. “I think these are ways that the lived experience for many Americans is going to be degraded because they don’t have access to cool communities or cool infrastructure.”

Listen to the podcast

 

Advancing Climate Policy in an Era of Deeply Partisan Politics

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In a deeply polarized political environment, Americans are more divided on climate change than ever before. Yet three recent developments could advance climate policy, despite partisan politics, according to a new article in the journal Political Science & Politics co-authored by UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation faculty director Megan Mullin and Patrick J. Egan of New York University:

  • Partisan cohesion and Democratic initiative. The Republican and Democratic parties have become more unified internally. While Republicans are less concerned about climate change than ever before, growing cohesion among Democrats, both among elected officials and members of the public, has elevated climate change as a party priority and increased their willingness to take electoral risks to address it.
  • Clean-energy expansion in Republican states. Even though decision-makers in Republican-led states have backpedaled on support for clean energy, those states are leaders in clean-energy production. Nearly 40% of U.S. renewable energy is situated in the Republican-led states of Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas, suggesting that markets can overcome politics in the transition to a clean-energy economy.
  • Partisan distribution of climate impacts. Heavily Republican areas may suffer disproportionately from the worst effects of climate change. Mullin and Egan bring together maps of climate risk with county voting records to show that Republican counties have higher percentages of properties at severe or extreme risk from flooding and fire over the next 30 years. This may inspire partisan voters to demand political action by their elected officials.

Read the full story, and find related research on the Center for Innovation’s Climate Adaptation and Resilience webpage.

 

Managing Extreme Heat as a New School Year Begins

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NBC News spoke to V. Kelly Turner, associate director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation (LCI), about the impact of soaring temperatures on students as the new school year begins. “Children’s bodies are not the same as adults. They are more vulnerable to extreme heat,” Turner said. “If kids don’t feel well or are angry or can’t concentrate, then of course they won’t test well.” She added, “Extreme heat is our new reality. Hot seasons will be longer and more intense, and for many children, school is the only place with air conditioning.” In a separate interview with the Los Angeles affiliate NBC4, Turner said that California lacks a statewide reporting system to track how K-12 schools experience heat, including which campuses have functioning cooling systems. The recent LCI policy brief Protecting Californians With Heat-Resilient Schools offers guidance on how to prioritize heat management on campuses, including through the establishment of a statewide indoor temperature limit.

Read the NBC News article
Watch the NBC4 interview

 

A Cautionary Note on the Easing of Water Restrictions

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Gregory Pierce, co-executive director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about the easing of water conservation orders by the L.A. Department of Water and Power. The DWP’s 4 million customers may now water their outdoor landscapes on three days a week, up from two days, thanks to a wet winter that replenished reservoirs that had been drained amid drought. Pierce said the DWP’s action is “reasonable as a short-term measure,” but he cautioned that residents should prepare to be flexible as global conditions grow hotter and drier. “I would prefer if the language were more like, two days is what you should expect — it’s going to be more common in the future — but we can allow three in the short-term because of this unusual water year,” said Pierce, who directs the UCLA Human Right to Water Solutions Lab. “I’d prefer the framing of two days as default, three as exceptional.”

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Turner on How to Protect Children From Extreme Heat

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V. Kelly Turner, associate director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, wrote an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times calling for action to protect California’s schoolchildren from extreme heat. “Schools are some of the hottest places in our region,” Turner wrote. “Single-story buildings surrounded by open, asphalt-dominated play yards with few trees provide little opportunity for cooling shade.” She identified a number of equity-minded funding opportunities, legislative actions and policy recommendations to help schools adapt to rising temperatures. Turner’s research into urban planning and design approaches that can make communities more resilient to climate change has made her a sought-after commentator this summer. CNN and KCRW spoke with Turner about adaptation strategies including planting shade trees and covering streets with cooling paint. And Ethnic Media Services covered a news briefing on coping strategies featuring Marta Segura, chief heat officer in the city of Los Angeles, Turner and other leaders.

Read the L.A. Times op-ed
Read the CNN article
Listen to the KCRW report
Read the Ethnic Media Services article

 

Sweltering Temperatures Take Toll on the Most Vulnerable

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V. Kelly Turner, associate director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, spoke to NBC4 News about the impact of Southern California’s heat wave on groups that are particularly vulnerable due to age, disability, low income and access to transportation. “I think about the sensitive populations who lack the resources or capacity to adapt when it gets really hot,” said Turner, who leads a research group focusing on policy approaches to protect people from extreme heat. “But I also think about people who are spending a lot of their time in settings where they’re exposed to too much heat. So that could be something like taking public transportation and being at a bus stop with no shelter.” In sweltering temperatures, she said, “we know that women are more likely to have preterm births. We know that children’s learning outcomes are degraded. We know that elderly are more likely to fall down.”

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A Call for Heat Preparedness at California Schools

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A California Healthline article on how to help schools become more heat-resilient in the face of global warming cited recommendations laid out in a policy brief from the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, including setting an indoor temperature limit and investing in shade and greenery for play areas. Two of the policy brief’s co-authors, Associate Professor of Urban Planning V. Kelly Turner and graduate student Lauren Dunlap, are currently modeling how increasing the tree canopy to 30% can affect heat stress and researching the different benefits of dispersed or clustered tree configurations. “Obviously, the California Education Board wasn’t set up to think about climate change. But now that climate change is a reality, virtually every sector is going to have to think about it,” Turner said. The article, which appeared in the Sacramento Bee, LAist and other outlets, noted that legislative action includes a bill by State Sen. Caroline Menjivar MSW ’18 that would require schools to have heat plans by 2027.

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