“The Time It Never Rained,” a classic novel set around the Texas drought of the 1950s, holds a unique place in the state’s folklore because it captures people’s ongoing struggle to adapt to the Texas weather captures what stands in our way.
And that’s a lot. Extreme temperatures are becoming more common across the country, posing new challenges to economic productivity. If water is the lifeblood of livestock, agriculture and cities, increasingly intense waves of extreme heat raise additional concerns.
Here’s why. The Office of the Texas State Climatologist at Texas A&M University predicts that average temperatures in Texas in 2036 will be 3 degrees warmer than the average temperature from 1950 to 1999 and 1.8 degrees warmer than the average from 1991 to 2020, as the Summers will be hot and dry with a breathtaking temperature with consecutive days over 100 degrees. And consecutive days of unabated extreme heat come at a price, according to several studies.
About a quarter of respondents to the Dallas Fed’s Texas Business Outlook Surveys in August reported lower revenue or production due to last summer’s heat. The Dallas Fed estimated that Texas’ GDP fell by 1%, or about $24 billion, due to the extreme heat.
According to the country’s latest national climate assessment released last week, the experience in Texas is a microcosm of what is happening elsewhere. Additionally, a 2017 study published in Nature Climate Change concluded that the proportion of the world’s population exposed to extreme heat for at least 20 days a year would increase from 30% to almost half by 2100, a record 25 weather disasters worth of more than $1 billion, much of which was made worse by higher temperatures. And based on their reporting, ProPublica and The New York Times estimate that 162 million people in the United States will most likely experience a decline in the quality of their environment due to more heat and less water.
Texas can’t do much about the weather. However, communities can do more to anticipate and mitigate the effects of extreme heat. Cities can create green spaces, paint streets and retrofit buildings with special cooling technologies. Or, like Dallas, they can participate in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Urban Heat Island Mapping Program, an initiative to create a detailed map of hotspots. Dallas plans to use the data to identify hotspots and develop targeted cooling strategies.
Lawmakers and the private sector must also be part of solutions that are cost-effective and transformative. The state’s power grid experienced several shortages this summer as usage increased and power lagged. As Texas’ population and businesses grow and temperatures rise, the state must have diversified energy sources and a more resilient electric grid. Likewise, it would be prudent for the private sector, including construction firms, to make their businesses and products less vulnerable to heat-related economic shocks.
How Texas adapts to continued heat will affect economic growth. Texas is not yet at a tipping point, but it should do everything it can now to protect our state’s economy from heat shocks.
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