Overview
- The Climate Change Committee published a major adaptation report in May 2026 that calls for legally enforceable maximum workplace temperatures, cooling in hospitals and care homes within about a decade, and cooling in schools by mid-century.
- The advisers project summers in southern England could regularly hit 40C by 2050 and reach 45C in worst scenarios, with about 92% of homes likely to overheat and heat-related deaths rising as high as 10,000 a year without action.
- The CCC recommends roughly £11 billion a year of public and private investment to fund cooling, reservoirs, flood defences and water-efficiency measures to avoid a projected England shortfall of up to five billion litres per day by 2055.
- Trade unions have backed enforceable temperature limits and stronger worker protections, the Health and Safety Executive is reviewing guidance, and ministers have said they will carefully consider the committee’s recommendations.
- Environmental groups warn that large-scale air conditioning could raise energy use, boost harmful refrigerants and worsen urban heat islands, so the CCC stresses low-carbon cooling technologies and nature-based measures alongside new regulation.