Heat wave of future

NY high-temp deaths to soar: study

Rising temperatures mean thousands could die from heat exposure in the Big Apple if greenhouse-gas emissions aren’t reduced, a new study shows.

By 2080, more than 3,000 people could die each year from heat-related deaths in New York City alone — a 400 percent increase — if efforts aren’t made to reduce greenhouse emissions and adapt to rising temperatures, scientists from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health found.

The biggest perpetrators of emissions? Skyscrapers.

“It’s the huge amount of building stock. Energy used for heating and cooling is the biggest component of greenhouse emissions in the city,” the study’s senior researcher, Dr. Patrick Kinney, told The Post.

The study was published in the Environmental Health Perspectives Journal and is being used by the New York City Panel on Climate Change.

Kinney said that by the 2050s, weather in New York City could feel a lot more like Virginia or Georgia.

“Parts of the city that have less greenery and parkland and places where more elderly peo- ple live alone and where there’s more poor people are the most affected,” Kinney said.

New York usually has about two major heat waves per summer. Kinney said we could be seeing as many as five to seven by the 2050s.

He said lawmakers already know what they need to do about the “alarming” death rates.

“If the city works hard to protect the population then we can avoid that . . . Things like heat warning systems . . . assisting people with using AC and helping them afford the energy for air conditioning,” Kinney said.

“We know what to do, it’s just a matter of motivating decision makers to do the right thing.”

Heat causes more fatalities in New York than any other weather event.

Part of the problem is the “urban heat island effect.”

Heat islands are created in urban areas when surfaces are covered by buildings and other structures. The sun’s rays are absorbed by these surfaces during the day and re-radiated at night, causing temperatures to be on average seven degrees warmer than surrounding areas. Under certain conditions, it can be as much as 10 to 20 degrees higher.