10 Jun 2026
Hot people in hot homes – cool heads needed
Written by Polly Turton, head of climate action and public health, Shade the UK
There were hot people in hot homes all over the UK during the last week of May, from London to Glasgow. Temperatures in some places exceeded 35 degrees Celsius during the day, and didn’t drop beneath a ‘tropical’ 20 degrees Celsius even at night.
This early heatwave, with yellow then amber heat health alerts, caught us all by surprise. From the general public going about their day to day lives, to professionals primed to expect hotter summers due to climate change.
The stories emerging from recent periods of extreme heat in the UK – of people suffering so unnecessarily and avoidably, in their homes, workplaces and in public spaces – should be enough for us all working in the UK built environment industry to reassess what we’re doing. And what we’re not doing. Our own 40 Degree Stories initiative is capturing these lived experiences to ensure a collective memory of how bad things can get.
There are no official figures yet on how many people may have died from the late May heat, but initial modelling by Imperial College London suggests there will have been at least 250 heat-related deaths over the Bank Holiday weekend alone .
We’ve had heat-related deaths before in the UK – there were approximately 3,000 during summer 2022, the 40 degree Celsius summer, and 1,500 during summer 2025, the hottest year on record, so far. This year, record-breaking hot weather arrived early, with low levels of public awareness about heat health and safety combining with insufficient heat adaptation and resilience measures in our homes, buildings and public spaces in concerning ways.
Each death is a human tragedy and in Shade the UK’s view any heat-related death in the UK is an avoidable one. We are working towards an outcome of zero deaths from overheating and a UK where everybody can thrive during hot weather.
But I fear it’s going to take an even bigger tragedy in the built environment sector to trigger the required cultural shift to ensure all UK homes, buildings and public spaces are safe during hot weather.
Careful consideration
Despite what some headlines might lead us to believe, the answer to reducing hot homes in the UK is not simply to install air conditioning.
To make our homes more comfortable, healthy and safe in the heat, in effective, efficient and equitable ways, we need to use a combination of ‘nature-based’, ‘passive design’, and ‘active ventilation and cooling’ measures in the right order.
Natural shade and cooling provided by trees, fixed shading features built into facades, external blinds and shutters, internal blinds and shutters, layouts designed to encourage natural air flow and ventilation, windows that are easy to open and close as and when needed, and mechanical and electrical ventilation and cooling systems. All these options are available to us.
We need to start from the outside in. Greener, shadier and cooler neighbourhoods, and lighter-coloured building materials and surfaces, reduce the amount of heat absorbed, retained and created by our buildings and urban environments. Decent insulation and external shade are then the most effective way to stop unwanted heat entering our homes, followed by internal shade. The layout of rooms and the location of openable windows are also key to ensuring natural air flow and ventilation of cooler air in the mornings, evenings and overnight if possible.
However, some people in some rooms in some homes will need the immediate benefits of on demand active cooling to stay healthy and safe in the heat. Once nature-based and passive design options have been deployed as far as practical, any active ventilation or cooling systems, such as ceiling fans, air-to-air source heat pumps and air conditioning units then integrated or installed for additional comfort cooling will work much more effectively, and efficiently.
To be clear, active cooling should not be the default option for ensuring thermal comfort, health and safety for the majority of new build homes, or for domestic retrofit projects. Many development sites and existing homes are able to accommodate tried and tested nature-based and passive design solutions, and we need to consider how we utilise them, up front and early on.
How we must adapt
Heat impacts and risks exacerbate existing inequalities and inequity. As Peter Apps observes in his book, ‘Homesick: How Housing Broke London and How to Fix It’, any existing issues with our housing stock are going to get worse with climate change.
We know that site viability, retrofit funds and household budgets are all squeezed. Therefore, to enable the required shift in our planning, design and engineering culture, to protect people from the impacts of overheating, we should reconsider where the value lies in our supply chains and incentive systems.
Continuing to build and retrofit homes without thinking about heat adaptation and resilience, may seem like the cheaper and less commercially risky option for developers, housebuilders and landlords. But passive design and nature-based solutions represent short-term and long-term value for local authorities, households and enlightened developers, as they provide wider benefits for communities, including helping to reduce bills.
Simple things like giving all balconies a shade-giving ‘lid’, especially on the top floor, and improving the quality of the public spaces around homes can make a difference to the ability of residents to keep themselves cool in their homes, and access cooler outdoor spaces during heatwaves.
Addressing heat impacts and risks is not just a housing or built environment issue; it cuts across public health, energy, value for money, communications and behaviour change.
The establishment of the National Heat Risk Commission is an important statement of intent. In the Commission’s words, we do not lack analysis of heat risk, we lack delivery.
Whilst work is underway to drive behaviour and culture change around heat in the UK, cool heads are needed. We need more collaboration and concerted action to ensure every investment or intervention in UK homes contributes to heat adaptation and resilience, and year-round thermal comfort.
