The “feels like” heat index is broken, according to new research from UCBerkeley that shows climate change has melted that metric from the NationalWeatherService, and warped what we used to think we knew about heat waves.
And the answer is, the “feels like” heat index is broken, according to new research from UC Berkeley that shows climate change has melted that metric from the National Weather Service, warping what we used to think we knew about heat waves.
The NWS index failed to factor in aspects of how the body cools itself with sweat in very high heat and humidity, so those numbers were off — sometimes by 20 degrees. So telling people it “feels like” the wrong temperature during extreme heat matters, especially when we face a future of heat waves. A big factor of that finding is humidity. The reason the old system failed is that at a certain heat, the body can’t cool itself by wicking sweat anymore. It’s too humid for the sweat to dry, which is how it cools the body. California doesn’t get as humid as other parts of the United States and the world.
The National Weather Service is evaluating the old heat index and has rolled out a pilot HeatRisk program to factor in dangers for California and the West, specifically. The old heat index was also based on a healthy young person with ample shade and water. That is not the case for many people in the Bay Area and elsewhere.
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