The world's largest cities under climate change and their adaptive capacity to rising heat.

ABSTRACT: We quantify future urban heat exposure and adaptation capacity for the 1563 largest global cities, for the first time globally integrating climate projections, urban morphology, and economic capacity. We use high-resolution mean annual temperature (MAT) projections under SSP1-2.6, SSP3-7.0, and SSP5-8.5. These are combined with Local Climate Zone (LCZ) profiles and downscaled socioeconomic data, evaluated consistently within morphological city boundaries. With this framework, we identify cities projected to exceed a 29 °C MAT threshold by 2071-2100. The number of threshold-exceeding cities is projected to rise from 17 (2011-2040) to 217 (2071-2100), exposing up to 320 million residents. Cities with compact built-up forms show higher exposure, while responsiveness to eight expert-curated ad

SUBMITTER: Friesen J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12457604 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature