GreenWorks to Lead NOAA Urban Heat Island Mapping Campaign

This summer, GreenWorks will map the hottest neighborhoods in Asheville and parts of Buncombe County, as one of 18 cities in an international study on extreme heat in urban areas.

GreenWorks has been selected to lead an Asheville-area heat mapping campaign as part of a program coordinated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Program Office, the interagency National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS), and CAPA Strategies, LLC.

GreenWorks will work with the National Weather Service to select one of the hottest days of the summer to conduct the mapping campaign. On mapping day, GreenWorks will coordinate volunteers to drive or bike an assigned route to collect temperature and humidity data with specialized climate sensors. That data will be translated into maps and shared with the community. 

“This mapping campaign will offer residents precise data on exactly which streets are the hottest. Climate challenges are shared, but they’re not shared equally. We already know that certain neighborhoods have fewer trees and experience disproportionately severe climate impacts. By documenting the lived experience of those residents, we will be better able to co-create targeted solutions that address this reality,” said Dawn Chávez, GreenWorks Executive Director.

GreenWorks will utilize this heat data to identify ideal tree-planting locations, and target canopy restoration efforts to the neighborhoods that need them the most. Trees lower pavement temperatures and home energy costs and improve air quality, making them one of the most effective ways to mitigate heat health impacts. The question is where to plant them.

“In extreme heat, a well-placed tree could save someone’s life,”said Chávez. 

GreenWorks has partnered with the National Environmental Modeling and Analysis Center (NEMAC), an applied research center at the University of North Carolina Asheville, and the City of Asheville Sustainability Department to help choose the areas to be mapped and create tools and maps interpreting and activating the project data. 

“Asheville is full of microclimates, which means the weather can feel completely different in parts of town that are less than a mile apart. In addition to revealing which neighborhoods are the hottest, this mapping campaign will identify factors like concentrations of pavement that are creating ‘islands’ of extreme heat. With precise data, we can create precise solutions,” said NEMAC Director Karin Rogers. 

In the recently adopted Municipal Climate Action Plan, the City of Asheville set the goal to utilize urban forestry practices on city land in priority neighborhoods to reduce heat island impacts and sequester carbon. “The mapping campaign data will enhance the city’s climate justice initiative resources and provide additional data to inform tree canopy action," said Kiera Bulan, Sustainability Program Manager for the City of Asheville.

GreenWorks has also partnered with the McCullough Institute at the University of North Carolina Asheville. This summer, GreenWorks will team up with an undergraduate McCullough Fellow and Associate Professor of Environmental Studies Jackie Langille from the UNC Asheville Department of Environmental Studies to transform the sensor data into an interactive street map that GreenWorks will use to identify ideal tree-planting locations in the area’s most heat-vulnerable neighborhoods. 

Alison Ormsby, Director of the McCullough Institute said, "One of the goals of the Institute is to support applied research into resilience and environmental sustainability topics. Asheville does not have an urban forest master plan yet; we are excited that this student-led research project can lay the foundation for one—and contribute to local efforts to restore our urban tree canopy and address climate-related heat risks." 

“For the last 50 years, GreenWorks has been a community of residents volunteering their time and creativity to solve the area’s most pressing environmental problems. Where pollution was the dominant challenge of the prior generation, climate change is ours. This is an incredible opportunity to get the whole community involved in understanding the challenges we face and finding solutions together,” said Chávez.

The core of the volunteer workforce for the mapping campaign will be GreenWorks’ own Youth Environmental Leadership Program and volunteer TreeKeepers. GreenWorks will also train interested members of the community to participate in the mapping campaign. 

The first community group to volunteer is the Blue Ridge Electric Vehicle Club, who have already pledged 20 electric vehicles and their drivers for the data collection process. “What better way to collect data on heat islands than with cars that have no emissions and are not contributing to the heat rise in our city?  It makes perfect sense to use electric vehicles for this task.  We would like to see electrification of transportation sooner than later,” said Rudy Beharrysingh, president of the Blue Ridge Electric Vehicle Club.