Climate change adaptation ideas

Ashton - thanks for the questions. I think these are both great ideas!

The District is actively thinking about urban heat island (UHI) issues and would definitely be interested in data that could be used to track micro-climates and also assess if interventions (tree planting, cool roofs, etc.) are making an impact. We currently have two sets of data that we rely on to understand the UHI – a surface temperature map that used Landsat data and a recently released ambient air temperature map produced by NOAA. These might be useful in terms of thinking where you might place sensors. I think we also might be interested in exploring internal temperatures like they did in the Harlem Heat Project.

There is definitely a need to better understand flooding since much of it is never reported by homeowners or residents to District government. While we have been able to map projections for tidal and riverine flooding, it is much more difficult to map heavy precipitation related flooding. Any information that can help us monitor this risk certainly would be useful. I think the trick here would be to develop a system that a wide cross-section of residents would actually use.

Best,

Melissa Deas (DOEE)

Melissa

>>We currently have two sets of data that we rely on to understand the UHI – a surface temperature map that used Landsat data and a >>recently released ambient air temperature map produced by NOAA.

are these datasets available to the public?

ref

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_heat_island

@Ashton Rohmer
Hi Ashton,
You may have met Don DuRousseau from GW (https://it.gwu.edu/don-durousseau) at the event last Saturday. There is a researcher at GW named Amanda Northcross (https://publichealth.gwu.edu/departments/environmental-and-occupational-health/amanda-northcross) who is interested in using low-cost sensors that can be available to residents and others to track micro-climate changes within the District. I would reach out to either of these folks to get a sense of what they are doing.

Jack

@Pedro Vicente
Thanks for the question. Both of these layers are new and not yet on Open Data DC. Reach out to me by email and I can see if we can get them to you.