Our world is getting warmer. On its current trajectory, average UK summers will be up to 4°C hotter than now. Heatwaves, such as the 2022 events that caused over 3,500 deaths and caused railways and hospitals to buckle, will become more frequent, more intense, and longer in duration. Major urban centres are particularly at risk, and cities the size of London will see temperatures up to 10°C higher than elsewhere.

To further this objective, this paper poses nine questions: four for the housing and built environment sectors, and five for government and policy. Our contention is that these are questions that we need to be asking, and grappling with, with some urgency. The questions we pose are intended to be the starting point for debate and conversation, and we think that unless we start thinking through these questions now, the impact of overheating in homes could be unnecessarily severe.