Organisation
Lambeth Council and Impact on Urban Health
Theme
Adaptation
Start Date
Jun 2025
End Date
Oct 2025
Goals
Heat, Resilient communities
Throughout London’s hottest summer on record, Lambeth Council partnered with Big Local North Brixton to deliver a research programme on heat risk.
The project set out to explore the effectiveness of heat advice, how social infrastructure can support residents and how cooling strategies work in real-life homes.
The Challenge
Heat risk is no longer a future concern; it’s a current and growing challenge.
The summer of 2025 was the hottest on record for London, with four UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) Amber weather warnings for heat. All five of the hottest UK summers have occurred since 2000, and the Met Office has concluded that heatwaves are now more prolonged and intense, with days over 40°C 20 times more likely than in the 1960s.
As climate change accelerates, extreme heat events are becoming more frequent, intense, and dangerous – especially in urban environments. The risk to our community from heatwaves is a new challenge facing Lambeth, and as a result, it is not known whether the current heat advice is practical for Lambeth residents.
While many of us might welcome a warm summer day, extreme heat can be a serious life life-threatening risk to older adults, young children, those with pre-existing health conditions, and people living in poorly insulated or overcrowded housing.
Lambeth, like many parts of London, faces a unique set of challenges:
- A high proportion of residents live in social housing or rented accommodation
- Limited access to green space in some areas
- Communities already managing other health and economic pressures
These intersecting factors mean that heat risk isn’t just an environmental issue; it's a public health issue, a housing issue, a social justice issue, and a local resilience issue.
As part of our Climate Action Plan (opens in a new window), Lambeth has committed to developing and delivering a borough-wide heat mitigation plan to reduce the risk of extreme heat impacts on vulnerable groups. With funding from Impact on Urban Health, Lambeth Council set out to establish what existing support systems are in place in our communities and how those community connections can be utilised in extreme summer temperatures to best support our most vulnerable residents.
Using a variety of data sets, areas of the borough that were most at risk during heatwaves were identified. This map demonstrates heat inequalities in Lambeth, considering multiple factors, including health, housing, community links, and environment. Loughborough Junction and Brixton North are in the 10% highest heat inequality borough-wide.
This analysis led Lambeth to partner with Big Local North Brixton, who were uniquely placed to connect with an ecosystem of hyperlocal organisations that provide services to particularly at-risk residents within the locality.
Action Taken
The research team, managed by Big Local, attended many events with our wider community partners throughout the summer. At these events, the researchers surveyed the community to establish awareness of heat risk, residents' perception of their own risk levels, and their understanding of how to mitigate against high temperatures.
Additionally, focus groups were held at various sites, including young families at Max Roach Children’s Centre and more mature people at Crowhurst Sheltered Housing. These sessions helped to capture residents' lived experiences of heat events, deepening our understanding of individuals' adaptive capacities and informing the researchers of barriers to mitigation.
A ‘Cool Kit’ cohort was also recruited alongside this broader research. The cohort was equipped with fans, cooling mats, water bottles, thermometers, and blinds, and they were tasked to test the equipment and provide feedback on their usefulness throughout the summer. UKHSA guidance on ventilation was also provided to help them keep their homes cool. Deep dives were hosted with this group before and after two heat events across the summer, to uncover barriers to mitigation and determine which mitigation tools were most helpful and when.
The usefulness of social media and communication channels was also tested to raise awareness of heat risk advice. Partners shared key messaging across their social media and WhatsApp channels, allowing the guidance to be shared directly with community members. As community service providers, our partners were well placed to reach some of our more vulnerable residents, providing timely advice and guidance at critical points, i.e. three days before the heat events.
Call to Action
Analysis is still underway, but from the anecdotal response so far, we’ve seen some clear themes regarding resident experiences during heat waves.
There will soon be lots more to share about the survey results and the formal insights from the project. Stay tuned to learn more.
If you are interested in partnering with Lambeth Council on similar work around adaptation or community engagement research, please email us at [email protected] (opens in a new window)
