What do you know about hazardous waste?: Arizona Health & Air Quality - NASA DEVELOP Summer 2015 @ Langley Resear...

Monday, August 3, 2015

Arizona Health & Air Quality - NASA DEVELOP Summer 2015 @ Langley Resear...

“Heat is a chronic problem here in Phoenix and most of the desert southwest which means that during the summer months it is extremely hot, pretty much all the time. And one of the challenges when you have a chronic health issue, like exposure to high heat and high temperature, is that people seem to not appreciate the risk as much. The subtlety of exposure to high heat is a challenge in both messaging as well as getting people to pay attention to those messages and take action.”

- Kate Goodin

This is an applied research project that was completed in 10 weeks by myself and a team of scientists for NASA DEVELOP.

This project was proposed to us by the State of Arizona, specifically the Maricopa County Department of Public Health, as they wanted to have an updated methods of helping those suffering from severe health issues related to intense heat exposure.

http://www.urbanheatislands.com/

“We think we can deploy our intervention strategies really to where the greatest need is with high precision and it's our hope that compiling the thermal imagery that this DEVELOP team has will enable us to incorporate environmental conditions into that discussion in a way that has never been done before.”

- Dr. David Hondula

Abstract:
Extreme heat causes more human fatalities in the United States than any other natural disaster, elevating the concern of heat-related mortality. Maricopa County Arizona is known for its high heat index and its sprawling metropolitan complex which makes this region a perfect candidate for human health research. Individuals at higher risk are unequally spatially distributed, leaving the poor, homeless, non-native English speakers, elderly, and the socially isolated vulnerable to heat events. The Arizona Department of Health Services, Arizona State University and NASA DEVELOP Langley Research Center are working to establish a more effective method of placing hydration and cooling centers in addition to enhancing the heat warning system to aid those with the highest exposure. Using NASA’s Earth Observation Systems from Aqua and Terra satellites, the daily spatial variability within the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect was quantified over the summer heat seasons from 2005 – 2014, effectively establishing a remotely sensed surface temperature climatology for the county. A series of One-way Analysis of Variance revealed significant differences between daily surface temperature averages of the top 30% of census tracts within the study period. Furthermore, synoptic upper tropospheric circulation patterns were classified to relate surface weather types and heat index. The surface weather observation networks were also reviewed for analyzing the veracity of the other methods. The results provide detailed information regarding nuances within the UHI effect and will allow pertinent recommendations regarding the health department’s adaptive capacity. They also hold essential components for future policy decision-making regarding appropriate locations for cooling centers and efficient warning systems.