There's a push to name and rank heat waves

Extreme heat causes more deaths in the United States than all other weather events — such as tornadoes and hurricanes — combined, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. And extreme heatwaves are getting longer and more frequent as the climate changes.

That’s why one group is pushing to name and rank heat waves, like we do hurricanes.

“It’s hard to solve a problem that people don’t know about. So first we need to communicate it, and we think that naming a heat wave is one of the very best ways that we can do that,” said Kathy Baughman McLeod, director of the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center at the Atlantic Council, which is nonpartisan.

The center is in talks with the World Meteorological Organization and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration about piloting heat wave names.

Baughman McLeod spoke with MPR News chief meteorologist and Climate Cast host Paul Huttner. You can hear their full conversation by clicking play on the audio player above.