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Shallow ground-source heat pumps (GSHPs) are a promising technology for contributing to the decarbonisation of the energy sector. In heating-dominated climates, the combined use of GSHPs for both heating and cooling increases their technical potential, defined as the maximum energy that can be exchanged with the ground, as the re-injection of excess heat from space cooling leads to a seasonal regeneration of the ground. This paper proposes a new approach to quantify the technical potential of GSHPs, accounting for effects of seasonal regeneration, and to estimate the useful energy to supply building energy demands at regional scale. The useful energy is obtained for direct heat exchange and for district heating and cooling (DHC) under several scenarios for climate change and market penetration levels of cooling systems. The case study in western Switzerland suggests that seasonal regeneration allows for annual maximum heat extraction densities above 300 kWh/m$^2$ at heat injection densities above 330 kWh/m$^2$. Results also show that GSHPs may cover up to 55% of heating demand while covering 57% of service-sector cooling demand for individual GSHPs in 2050, which increases to around 85% with DHC. The regional-scale results may serve to inform decision making on strategic areas for installing GSHPs. Walch and Li contributed equally. Revision submitted to Energy

For the Chinese, French, German, and Spanish translations of the abstract see Supplementary Materials section.

In the past few decades, major public health advances have happened in Europe, with drastic decreases in premature mortality and a life expectancy increase of almost 9 years since 1980. European countries have some of the best health-care systems in the world. However, Europe is challenged with unprecedented and overlapping crises that are detrimental to human health and livelihoods and threaten adaptive capacity, including the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the fastest-growing migrant crisis since World War 2, population displacement, environmental degradation, and deepening inequalities. Compared with pre-industrial times, the mean average European surface air temperature increase has been almost 1°C higher than the average global temperature increase, and 2022 was the hottest European summer on record. As the world's third largest economy and a major contributor to global cumulative greenhouse gas emissions, Europe is a key stakeholder in the world's response to climate change and has a global responsibility and opportunity to lead the transition to becoming a low-carbon economy and a healthier, more resilient society. Peer Reviewed Article signat per 44 autors/autores: Institute for Global Health (K R van Daalen MPhil, M Romanello PhD), Institute for Sustainable Resources (P Drummond MSc, D Scamman EngD), and Energy Institute (Prof I Hamilton PhD, H Kennard PhD), University College London, London, UK; Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK (K R van Daalen); Heidelberg Institute of Global Health, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany (Prof J Rocklöv PhD, Prof J C Semenza PhD); Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine (Prof J Rocklöv, Z Farooq MSc, M O Sewe PhD, H Sjödin PhD) and Department of Epidemiology and Global Health (Prof M Nilsson PhD), Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden; Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), Barcelona, Spain (C Tonne ScD, H Achebak PhD, J Ballester PhD, S J Lloyd PhD, C Milà MSc, Prof J C Minx PhD, Prof M Nieuwenhuijsen PhD, M Quijal-Zamorano MSc, Prof J M Anto MD); Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), Barcelona, Spain (C Tonne, C Milà, M Nieuwenhuijsen, M Quijal-Zamorano, J M Anto); CIBER Epidemiología y Salud Pública (CIBERESP), Barcelona, Spain (C Tonne, C Milà, J C Minx, M Nieuwenhuijsen, J M Anto); BC3 Basque Centre for Climate Change, Bilbao, Spain (Prof A Markandya PhD); School of Government, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK (N Dasandi PhD); Data Science Lab, Hertie School, Berlin, Germany (Prof S Jankin PhD, H Bechara PhD, O Gasparyan PhD); Priestley International Centre for Climate, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK (M W Callaghan MPP); Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change, Berlin, Germany (M W Callaghan); Energy Efficiency Group, Institute for Environmental Sciences (ISE), University of Geneva, Switzerland (J Chambers PhD); Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici (CMCC), Venice, Italy (S Dasgupta PhD); Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Sciences (LSE), UK (S Dasgupta, Prof E J Z Robinson PhD); Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC), Barcelona, Spain (N Gonzalez-Reviriego PhD, B Solaraju-Murali MSc, Prof R Lowe PhD, M Lotto Batista MSc); Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI), Helsinki, Finland (R Hänninen DSci, J Palamarchuk PhD, M Sofiev PhD); European Environment Agency, Copenhagen, Denmark (A Kazmierczak PhD); European Centre for Environment and Health, WHO Regional Office for Europe, Bonn, Germany (V Kendrovski PhD, O Schmoll Dipl Ing); Air Quality and Greenhouse Gases Programme, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Laxenburg, Austria (G Kiesewetter PhD); Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, Department of Epidemiology, Brunswick, Germany (M Lotto Batista); Department of Genetics and Microbiology, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain (Prof J Martinez-Urtaza PhD); Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food and Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK (M Springmann PhD); Department of Electronics and Computer Science, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago, Spain (J Triñanes PhD); Centre for Climate Change and Planetary Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), London, UK (Prof R Lowe); Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain (Prod R Lowe)

AbstractAs the linkages between extreme weather events, changes in climatic conditions and health impacts in exposed populations become clearer, so does the need for climate‐smart decisions aimed at making the public health sector more responsive and resilient. By integrating climate and health information, climate services for health provide robust decision‐support tools. The Lancet Countdown monitoring system uses global climate reanalyses products to track annual changes in a set of health‐related outcomes. In the monitoring system, multiple variables from reanalysis datasets such as ERA5 and ERA5‐Land are retrieved and processed to capture heatwaves, precipitation extremes, wildfires, droughts, warming and ecosystem changes across the globe and over multiple decades. This reanalysis‐derived information is then input into a hazard–exposure–vulnerability framework that delivers, as outcomes, indicators tracking the year‐by‐year impacts of climate‐related hazards on human mortality, labour capacity, physical activity, sentiment, infectious disease transmission, and food security and undernutrition. Building on the reanalysis gridded format, the indicators create worldwide ‘maps without gaps’ of climate–health linkages. Our experience shows that reanalysis datasets allow standardization across the climate information used in the framework, making the system potentially adaptable to multiple geographical scales. An ongoing challenge is to quantify how the inherent bias of global reanalyses influences indicator outcomes. We foresee the health sector as a key user of reanalysis products. Therefore, public health professionals and health impact modellers should be involved in the co‐development of future iterations of reanalysis datasets, to reach finer spatial resolutions and provide a wider set of health‐relevant climate variables.

AbstractEmpirical evidence suggests that the effects of anthropogenic climate change, and heat in particular, could have a significant impact on mental health. This article investigates the correlation between heatwaves and/or relative humidity and suicide (fatal intentional self-harm) on a global scale. The covariance between heat/humidity and suicide was modelled using a negative binomial Poisson regression with data from 60 countries between 1979–2016. Statistically significant increases and decreases in suicide were found, as well as many cases with no significant correlation. We found that relative humidity showed a more significant correlation with suicide compared to heatwaves and that both younger age groups and women seemed to be more significantly affected by changes in humidity and heatwave counts in comparison with the rest of the population. Further research is needed to provide a larger and more consistent basis for epidemiological studies; to understand better the connections among heat, humidity and mental health; and to explore in more detail which population groups are particularly impacted and why.