Climate Change, Heat Waves and Thermal Comfort—Reflections on Housing Policy in India

Housing ideally supplies many physical comforts, social and economic benefits, as well as forms the basis for the right to the city. It also addresses an additional challenge of adaptation to the current as well as expected impacts of climate change—one of them being heat waves—especially in the context of developing countries like India. Few studies in the Indian context have explicitly examined the experience of heat on the indoor temperatures linked to the housing quality and typologies and the quality of the surroundings. Official state and urban policies do not explicitly include heatproofing for existing or new housing to address indoor heat exposure, especially in the case of vulnerable populations. We have measured the indoor and outdoor temperatures in 860 low-income residents living in three different housing typologies in 26 settlements (formal and informal) of Ahmedabad, India, in peak summer months. Building the case for a long-term urban housing strategy to address the impact of indoor temperature particularly for low-income households and residents of informal housing, we argue that conscious and deliberate efforts towards heatproofing existing informal housing are required. One of the options, which is being pursued currently, is transiting informal housing dwellers to formal housing. But, another one for immediate consideration is renewal of current informal housing due to limited coverage possibility of the first option.