Heat Islands

Kevin Brown, Ag Resource Specialist, BCCD
I was watching the local news the other day (I won’t say which one as to not incriminate them) and they started talking about this new study that was out where they had looked at “heat islands”.  Have you ever heard of a “heat island” before?  I would not expect that many people to have heard of such a thing, and I didn’t really expect the anchors to know about it, but I was pretty surprised that the weatherman didn’t really seem to know what it was referencing.   No, it is not anything like Love Island, LOL.  Heat Islands are urban areas that, just by their nature, absorb more heat during the day and then continue to stay a lot warmer during the nighttime hours.  Then, guess what happens the next day?   They heat back up even faster than the day before- and so the cycle continues.  What is the end result?  You guessed it, it is a lot warmer than surrounding, non-developed land.  What can confound the problem even more is that the wind typically blows less in the cities.  That makes it even harder for these areas to dissipate heat.  As we continue to see Mother Earth getting warmer, we tend to blame a lot of things.  Maybe some of these things are real, and maybe they are a figment of someone’s imagination to get you to donate to their cause.  However, anyone that knows anything about concrete and asphalt will tell you that these products definitely hold in more heat for longer periods of time than soil or grass.  So, the more we build, the worse it gets.  Have you ever tried to walk across asphalt on a 90-degree day with the sun beating on it?  (Don’t try it!)  Now walk across your plush yard.  Think there is a difference?  Uh, yea. 

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Now, we can talk about all the other things that people love to talk about and research and ask you to donate to the cause for, but here is one thing that is surely causing our planet to get warmer.  And do we care?  Well, most don’t.  Just go look at how fast we are putting up more houses and more businesses and more pavement and roads and you can surely see that we really don’t care.  We will blame those nebulous things like cows passing gas and those big business just keep polluting, but we won’t blame ourselves.  Just give me my 3 houses and shopping places up and down the strip so I can have it all right here.

As I sit here and write, I think about the big cities and wonder just how big of a problem they really are- they keep growing and growing and sending more and more water to the rivers and stream (flooding) and not into the ground, and now making the planet hotter and hotter.  Let’s continue to make, and expand, more of them.  What a great idea.

Some things that could make a difference- Can we paint our roads and buildings white?  There are studies out there that are looking at doing so.  With modern technology, maybe we can find something else that reflect the sun’s warmth that would work, but white paint will do it.  Green rooves, as far as actually planting vegetation in flat rooves, would help.  Maybe solar panels above the dark surface would help some??  That one I don’t know the answer to.  Planting trees or having more green space in the cities.

On a side note, my coworker researched concrete and found that just the concrete alone accounts for 8% of all GHG emissions (CICERO Center for International Climate Research).  To get perspective, the global airline industry is 2.8%.  Concrete first raises GHG’s directly, and then it keeps temperatures warmer than the surrounding area by holding in more heat. There may be some instances where we need it, but in other places an alternative could be best.

The Bradford County Conservation District is committed to helping people manage resources wisely.  You can visit the Bradford County Conservation District at 200 Lake Rd in Wysox across from the Wysox Fire Hall. Contact us at (570) 485-3144 or visit our web page at www.bccdpa.com.