When ocean temperatures soar, the impacts don’t stay in the water. Across coastal communities, marine heat waves can threaten livelihoods, food security and human health—with children especially vulnerable to the consequences.
New research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found that children exposed to more marine heat waves face higher risks of death, suffer stunted growth or experienced a life-threatening form of malnutrition called wasting that can leave children dangerously underweight.
Marine heat waves occur when ocean temperatures rise unusually high for a particular region and time of year—and persist for at least five days. They can last weeks or even months. As climate change continues to warm the world’s oceans, these extreme events are becoming more common.
“We are seeing that marine heat waves are increasing in their frequency, in their intensity and in their duration across the world,” said Sally Dowd, an interdisciplinary fisheries scientist who co-authored the study.
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A £400m UK government loan to the Tropical Forests Forever Facility tightens the link between embodied carbon and real forest outcomes. Bio‑based and renewable building materials will now be judged on credible, deforestation‑free supply chains as much as on glossy lifecycle assessment or whole life carbon assessment outputs, driving wider use of environmental product declarations (EPDs), green building materials and green building products. Expect stronger traceability, circular construction strategies and end‑of‑life reuse in construction when specifying low embodied carbon materials and low carbon construction materials to cut the carbon footprint of construction and support the circular economy in construction.
Updated damp and mould guidance from the Chartered Institute of Building and the Chartered Institute of Housing reframes indoor environmental quality as a health obligation, pressing social landlords towards whole‑house ventilation, insulation upgrades and continuous monitoring. The shift embeds sustainable building design and energy‑efficient buildings as compliance issues, with implications for life cycle cost, building lifecycle performance and net zero whole life carbon pathways recognised by BREEAM and BREEAM v7.
A new retrofit procurement guide uses public spending to expand capacity, create local jobs and tackle skills shortages by baking training and labour targets into contracts. This gives sustainable construction and decarbonising the built environment delivery teeth, promoting life cycle thinking in construction, resource efficiency in construction and eco‑design for buildings, alongside sustainable material specification and low carbon building upgrades that support carbon neutral construction.
Escalating climate risks—from European wildfires to transboundary smoke and cascading Himalayan floods—are accelerating environmental sustainability in construction and sustainable urban development. Design for resilience is becoming core to net zero carbon buildings and green construction, with fire‑hardening, smoke filtration, heat‑safe interiors and green infrastructure specified to reduce the environmental impact of construction, deliver carbon footprint reduction over whole life carbon and strengthen eco‑friendly construction and sustainable architecture.
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