Mid-Michigan Heat Model The Mid-Michigan Heat Model: A Modeling Framework for Informing Decision Maker Response to Extreme Heat Events in Michigan Under Climate Change Dr. Laura Schmitt Olabisi1 Dr. Ralph Levine1 Lorraine Cameron, MPH, PhD2 Michael Beaulac3 Robert Wahl2 Dr. Stuart Blythe4 1Department of Community, Agriculture, Recreation and Resource Studies, Michigan State University 2Michigan Department of Community Health 3Michigan Department of Environmental Quality 4Writing, Rhetoric and American Cultures, Michigan State University This project was funded by the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences + Assessments Center through a 2011 Great Lakes Climate Assessment Grant. Recommended Citation: Olabisi,L.S., R. Levine, L. Cameron, M. Beaulac, R. Wahl, and S. Blythe. 2012: A Modeling Framework for Informing Decision Maker Response to Extreme Heat Events in Michigan Under Climate Change. In: 2011 Project Reports. D. Brown, D. Bidwell, and L. Briley, eds. Available from the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences and Assessments (GLISA) Center. For further questions, please contact Dr. Laura Schmitt Olabisi at [email protected]. www.glisa.msu.edu PROJECT BRIEF: THE MID-MICHIGAN HEAT MODEL Contents Project Summary ................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Problem Addressed in this Project ................................................................................................................................................ 3 Methods ..................................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Decision-Maker Engagement ........................................................................................................................................................... 4 Findings ..................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Model Findings ................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 Workshop Findings ....................................................................................................................................................................... 5 Key lessons on conducting climate assessment work in the region ................................................................. 6 References ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 6 Appendix A: Model Interface with Baseline Model Settings ............................................................................................... 7 Appendix B: Model Structure ........................................................................................................................................................... 7 Appendix C: Workshop Feedback on MMHM Model ............................................................................................................ 10 Strengths .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 10 Limitations ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 10 Appendix D: List of Organizations Represented at Stakeholder Workshop Held in Detroit May 2, 2012 ... 11 www.glisa.umich.edu Last updated: 6/9/2015 2 PROJECT BRIEF: THE MID-MICHIGAN HEAT MODEL Project Summary example, moving to an air conditioned building or shelter (McGeehin & Mirabelli, 2001). The health effects of extreme Extreme heat events are responsible for more annual heat events therefore present an environmental justice deaths in the United States than other natural disasters problem. combined, and global and regional climate models have indicated that more severe and longer lasting heat events Studies indicate that the relationship of extreme heat to are likely to occur in the upper Midwest over the next adverse health effects is complex. It is not only the several decades. Epidemiological studies have contributed maximum temperature and humidity on a given day that to the identification of populations vulnerable to extreme can cause physiologic distress (Haines, et al., 2006). The heat. However, local decision-makers still lack tools that duration of heat over a number of days, and in particular would help them evaluate policy and management options the elevation of minimum nighttime temperatures without to reduce heat risk for these vulnerable populations, and to a recuperative period can push the vulnerable into a health prevent deaths and illness once a heat event arrives. We crisis (McGeehin & Mirabelli, 2001). Adverse health effects developed a system dynamics modeling tool, called the Mid- include heat stroke, heat illness, and exacerbation of Michigan Heat Model (MMHM), to depict the dynamics of chronic conditions such as asthma and cardiovascular hospitalizations and deaths over the course of a heat event disease (Kovats & Hajat, 2008; Lin, et al., 2009). in Detroit. Modelers incorporated input from decision- Other research has suggested that the behavior and makers at each stage of the model-building process, and the attitudes of vulnerable populations during a heat event are project culminated with a workshop in which potential critically important determinants of how their health is model-users offered feedback on MMHM. The process of affected. For example, individuals’ perceptions of their risk building a model in a participatory manner was useful for may spur them to take action during a heat event, or facilitating conversations and data-exchange around an conversely, may preclude them from taking action (Wolf, et important topic, and for developing a tool with the greatest al., 2010). Local and state public health officials in Michigan potential utility. MMHM could be made more powerful and have expressed concern that residents of cities such as useful by adapting its framework to local circumstances for Detroit and Ann Arbor are not using cooling centers during decision-making at the municipality scale, and by heat events; however, the reasons for this are not well combining its dynamics with spatial modeling. understood. Any model that develops realistic options for intervention in the human health impacts of extreme heat events will have to depict the behavioral dynamics of the Problem Addressed in this Project populations at whom the intervention is targeted. Global and regional climate change models have projected In summary, the impacts of extreme heat on human health an increase in the frequency, duration and severity of in the Midwest are complex, dynamic, and likely to become extreme heat events in the upper Midwest. The frequency of more severe under climate change. Responses to these hot days and the length of the heat-wave season will be impacts will necessarily involve communication and more than twice as great under a higher emissions scenario coordination among decision-makers at the state and local compared to a lower one (United States Global Change levels. To address both of these aspects of extreme heat, we Research Program, 2009). This means that heat waves chose to develop a prototype tool to shed light on the equivalent to the one that killed over 700 people in Chicago dynamics of human health during extreme heat events, in 1995 (Klinenberg, 2002) are projected to occur about presented in a format that is useful for local decision- once every three years in the Midwest under the lower makers. emissions scenario, and nearly three times a year under the higher emissions scenario (Hayhoe, et al., 2010). It has been known for some time that extreme heat events Methods can cause increased incidence of human illness, We chose to build the model using a system dynamics hospitalizations, and death. The old, the young, and those framework in order to depict the dynamics of vulnerable with chronic health conditions are less able to perceive the populations (Appendix B). System dynamics can effectively stress on their bodies and are physiologically less able to integrate multiple types of information that describe the withstand this stress (Khosla & Guntupalli, 1999; O’Neill, et demographic, climatic, behavioral, and socio-economic al., 2009). Residents of urban areas are subject to the ‘heat aspects of heat events (Hirsch, et al., 2007; Schmitt Olabisi, island’ effect where pavement and structures retain heat, et al., 2010). We used Stella™, a system dynamics software resulting in even higher and more persistent temperatures package with an interface that allows users to manipulate (Tan, et al., 2010). In addition, social factors such as poverty variables and observe the resulting change in model output. and isolation may limit the ability of some population Two groups of stakeholders were involved in building the subgroups to take actions to reduce their heat stress by for model, which was named the Mid-Michigan Heat Model www.glisa.umich.edu Last updated: