Conference Agenda

We study the impact of high temperatures on milder mental health outcomes using clinical administrative data from a National Health Service (NHS) program in England that treats anxiety and depression. Exploiting monthly temperature variations at the Clinical Commissioning Group level, we find that extreme heat - specifically, temperatures above 34℃ - leads to a significant increase in demand for mental health support, assessments, and treatments by approximately 10%, 15%, and 12%, respectively. The effects are particularly pronounced when heat shocks are prolonged, with heat waves lasting more than ten days amplifying the impact. Importantly, these results are not driven by individuals' adaptive responses to similar heat stress experienced in the previous month or year. The effects are stronger for individuals with higher socio-economic status, particularly when avoidance options, such as air conditioning, are limited. Using microdata on medical prescriptions for mental health conditions, we find similar effects for anxiolytics and antidepressants within the same temperature range. A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that the monetary health costs associated with heat stress are substantial.

Climate change is already having a measurable impact on labour forces across the globe, with far reaching implications for economic growth, in addition to worker health, firm profitability, poverty and inequality, and food security, to name but a few. This study quantifies the impacts of heat stress on the UK labour force, focusing on labour supply, labour productivity, the health of workers, and the extent to which and how adaptation and adaptive capacity is reducing the negative impacts of extreme heat. We collected data in 2024 during the UK summer, just after a period of anomalous heat, surveying over 2,000 people in the UK labour force, when their recollection of the heat episode was fresh in their memories. Using microeconometric analysis and controlling for a rich set of demographic, occupational, and adaptation covariates, our results clearly show that workers do perceive their health to be harmed by heat stress, and workers and employers rely on a wide range of adaptation measures that are at least partially effective. A 1°C increase in temperature anomaly from the long-term average increases the probability of a worker reducing their hours by 9.9% and effort by 9.5%. However, the effect on workers who received advanced alerts of heat episodes was 6.2% and 6.7% respectively, suggesting that adaptation is only partially effective. In the case of worker health, advanced

warning reduces the probability of workers reporting adverse health effects due to heat episodes by approximately 5 percentage-points.

This study investigates the impact of public concern about climate change on municipal-level adaptation investments. To this end, we develop a novel indicator of climate change concern and analyze its influence on local government spending, accounting for various factors, including exposure to extreme weather events, political cycles, demographic characteristics, and socioeconomic conditions within municipalities. Employing a fixed-effects regression model to the case of Italy, we find that higher levels of climate change concern are positively associated with increased adaptation investments, with responsiveness particularly pronounced during electoral campaigns. Our findings contribute to the understanding of how public concern about climate change shapes local government policy decisions and offer valuable insights for policymakers seeking to address climate change at the local level

As the world warms, the likelihood of achieving the Paris targets becomes increasingly unlikely. The change in frequency and intensity of extreme weather events attributed to man-made Climate Change poses a risk to contemporaneous societies. Understanding those risks and mapping the potential extent of damage from Climate Change induced extreme weather events is key in a changing world. To this end, a multidisciplinary approach to the problem is called for. By combining 3-hourly, downscaled climate data on mean sea level pressure under the Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP) 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5, estimates of economic damages from storms, sub-national GDP data, and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP) projections, this study attempts to map the spatially explicit economic impacts of changing storm patterns under Climate Change in the Iberian Peninsula between 2020 and 2100. Estimates are spatially explicit at the 0.11º level, contributing to better-informing policymakers on the economic risks of climate change by assessing the costs under different emission scenarios.