Large swaths of Eastern Canada are under heat warnings Friday, while areas in the central and northern regions of the country are enduring poor air quality due to wildfire smoke.
Meanwhile, extreme heat has been linked to a surge in deaths in France and Belgium, and several states in the eastern U.S. are under extreme heat warnings.
Follow for key updates and tips to stay cool:
How to save money with your AC
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, adjusting your thermostat by 4 to 6 C for eight hours a day can save up to 10 per cent a year on heating and cooling.
Experts say there are a lot of factors to consider when deciding what AC habits save the most energy and money.
“If you’re gone for like 15 minutes to go to the grocery store, you don’t get any gain” by turning off your AC, said Elizabeth Hewitt, professor and urban planning expert at Stony Brook University in New York state.
But as a general rule, “if you’re going for your work day, say for eight hours or so, you’ll almost always save more energy and money by turning things off,” she said.
The Associated Press. Find more tips here.
Food trucks close for worker safety in Windsor
Several food trucks in Windsor are delaying their opening times or temporarily closing as extreme heat makes conditions inside and around the mobile kitchens unsafe for employees.
WindsorEats confirmed its food trucks will not operate at its Erie Street East food hall this weekend because of the heat, including during Saturday’s Canada round-of-16 watch party.
Sanjay Maru, CTVNewsWindsor.ca journalist. Read the full story here.
Thousands lose power in Quebec
More than 50,000 Hydro-Quebec clients were without electricity Friday morning after thunderstorms battered the region and a heat wave continues.
As many as 100,000 clients lost power Thursday night, with the Laurentians and Lanaudiere the hardest hit.
As of Friday morning, those two regions had 19,661 and 18,833 outages, respectively. Laval had another 10,354 without electricity. Hydro-Québec confirmed that these power outages were caused by Thursday’s thunderstorms that swept through these regions.
“We already have crews on the ground working to restore power to affected homes,” said Audrey St-Pierre, a spokesperson for Hydro-Québec, on Thursday evening.
Amy Luft, CTVNewsMontreal.ca supervising producer. Read the full story here.
Drifting smoke
Environment Canada has issued air quality warnings for northwestern New Brunswick as smoke from wildfires in Quebec causes poor air quality and reduced visibility.
The alert was issued Friday morning, expected to be in place until Saturday afternoon.
Air quality in Edmundston, N.B., is calculated at a level four or “moderate risk,” or level nine with a high risk in smoke.
Lauren Roulston, CTVNewsAtlantic.ca journalist. Read the full story here.
New Brunswick restaurants close early due to heat
The owner of two restaurants in Shediac, N.B., decided things were too hot to handle in the kitchen, prompting him to close both locations earlier than usual.
“I just felt really bad for my staff. It was really hot (on Thursday). They were really sweating,” said Jamie Dionne, owner of Lenny’s Takeout.
He says his employees were happy to go home early, and Dionne also received positive feedback on social media for keeping his staff top of mind.
“I worked in the kitchen myself, so I know how it is. I’d say it’s 20 degrees hotter in there than it is in the air conditioning,” he added.
“I don’t want my staff to be unhappy.”
The extreme heat is forecast to continue in Shediac on Friday, with maximum temperatures of 30 to 34 C, according to Environment Canada. The agency issued a yellow heat warning for the town, saying humidex values reaching 40 are expected.
Derek Haggett, CTVNewsAtlantic.ca journalist. Read the full story here.
Why fans can warm you in extreme heat
Fans can help cool the body in many situations, but experts say their effectiveness depends on factors such as temperature, humidity and age. In extreme conditions, a fan may provide little benefit and can even contribute to heat gain.
“To understand the problem, you need to start thinking that people are like a little heater,” said Stefano Schiavon, a professor of architecture and civil and environmental engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, in an interview with CTVNews.ca.
“There is heat that we generate inside the body and that heat needs to be constantly released.”
Under normal conditions, the body loses heat to the surrounding air when the air is cooler than the skin. This process is known as convection - heat moving from the body into cooler air.
At a certain point, however, that airflow can become counterproductive, because the body can begin absorbing heat from the environment instead.
“When the temperature is above the temperature of your skin, then the first mechanism, convection, doesn’t work anymore,” Schiavon said. “It actually harms you because it’s warming you up.”
In more humid conditions, fans can continue to help by improving evaporation when sweat is not evaporating efficiently on its own. But as humidity rises further, evaporation becomes increasingly difficult and the cooling benefits of a fan may diminish.
Tammy Ibrahimpoor, CTVNews.ca producer. Read the full story here.
Heat’s toll in Belgium
Belgium recorded 39 per cent more deaths than normal between June 18 and 29 as a sweltering heat wave gripped much of Europe, health authorities said Friday.
The country saw 1,222 excess deaths during the period, of which nearly half were of people aged 85 or over, according to provisional data from the federal health ministry.
“Such a level of excess mortality during a heat wave is unprecedented in our country,” it said in a statement, noting that Belgium had recorded “seven tropical days of temperatures exceeding 30 C as well as “abnormally” warm nights.
AFP. Read the full story here.
Deaths surge in France
Deaths surged by nearly a third in France during the hottest week of a record heat wave last month, the country’s public health authority said Friday, reporting at least 2,000 more deaths than in the previous week when temperatures were already climbing and filling emergency wards with heat victims.
The new and still incomplete figures from Public Health France doubled its first preliminary estimate of at least 1,000 additional deaths that it gave last Sunday. That earlier estimate covered just three of the hottest days of extreme, deadly heat.
In Paris, funeral service directors have said they’ve struggled to find places to store bodies before burial or cremation, with some mortuaries saying they were full and having to turn bodies away.
The updated tally of deaths from Public Health France spans the week of June 22-28, during which France saw its hottest-ever days and records shattered for peak daytime and nighttime temperatures in many cities and towns across the country. The heat also broke temperature records in many other parts of Europe.
The Associated Press. Read the full story here.
How to cool your home without air conditioning
Experts tell the AP simple steps like blocking sunlight can go a long way in keeping homes cool.
Gregor Henze, an architectural engineering professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, pointed to “time-honoured strategies” such as opening windows at night when it’s cooler.
In dry climates, that night air doesn’t add much moisture, but in humid regions it can bring in dampness the AC will later need to remove.
The Associated Press. Find more tips here.
