Europe’s heat problem goes beyond the weather

By Robert C. Jones Jr. [email protected] 07-07-2026

Driven by a persistent high-pressure system, a third severe heat wave of the year is scorching Europe this week, with temperatures expected to soar as much as 18 degrees Fahrenheit above average across western parts of the continent, including Spain, Portugal, France, and Britain.

Even more alarming: Europe is heating up faster than any other continent, warming at twice the global average, with many researchers pointing to anthropogenic emissions, shifts in atmospheric circulation, and the continent's proximity to the rapidly warming Arctic as key factors in this trend.

The result has been an increase in heat-related deaths. In a June 28 post on X, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said more than 1,300 excess deaths "linked to high temperatures in Europe" had been recorded since June 21.

"Right now, 150 million people are living under extreme heat, hundreds have died, schools are shut, grids are buckling," he said.

Tedros' post was, indeed, troubling. And it is what he also included in that message that should raise eyebrows: "European homes, workplaces, and schools were not built for these temperatures."

He may have been alluding in part to the scarcity of air conditioning in Europe. Fact is, air conditioning is a rarity across the continent, with only about 20 percent of households equipped with units compared to nearly 90 percent in the U.S.

Europe's historically low adoption of air conditioning is couched in history more than anything else, according to Joanna Lombard, a professor in the University of Miami School of Architecture and a founding member of the Built Environment, Behavior, and Health Team, an interdisciplinary University initiative that investigates how urban design and landscape impact health, walkability, and community resilience.

"Northern Europe, as in the northern U.S., is generally built to keep people warm, since the climate generally was cooler and staying warm was the dominate mode. So, air conditioning wasn't considered a life essential. Before the 1960s for that matter, most homes in South Florida weren't air-conditioned," Lombard said.

"In Southern Europe, the architecture similarly evolved in response to climate," she said. "Buildings were oriented toward cooling breezes, double layers of shutters kept the sun out during the heat of the day, and in both Northern and Southern Europe, the humidity levels are generally lower than in the Southern U.S. So, it's easier to achieve evaporative cooling. And then most of Southern Europe is around the latitude of the northern U.S. So again, heating was needed more often than cooling."

Lombard noted that when generational heat waves occurred-both in Europe in 2003 and in Chicago in 1995, the latter resulting in more than 730 heat-related deaths over five days-the impacts were devastating, ushering in the "cool roof" movement in the U.S., in which the rooftops of northern cities were painted white. Those devastating heat waves also prompted state and federal programs to provide more air conditioning units in communities.

"Now, the current heat and humidity load push beyond the adaptative capacities of the buildings, and what was a rare heat wave is a less rare phenomenon, and everyday summer heat is increasing," Lombard said. "So, I think attitudes based on a previous historical reality will change in the face of current conditions. And the architecture will need to adapt."

While newer buildings are designed for air conditioning, retrofitting older buildings is proving more difficult, "which might be why many northern U.S. cities have older buildings where the dominant mode of air conditioning is window units," she explained. "But whatever the mode of reducing heat loads and providing cooling in cities and within buildings, the need for adaptation is increasingly urgent."

Lombard noted, however, that while air conditioning units might cool rooms, they won't cool cities. "All the urban heat issues still need to be addressed," she said.